


Paper and Fire, Angel and Liar

by RobertGrey



Series: Unholy Runaway [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Fiction, Introductions & Chapters, Literature, Spiritual & Occult, prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-19
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-25 16:01:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 41,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9827759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RobertGrey/pseuds/RobertGrey
Summary: The first instalment of the Unholy Runaway series, we are taken to the very beginning, where a dissatisfied with his life young man decides to summon a demon, to try to live the remainder of his life in comfort by selling his soul. However, he finds that a certain agreement between demons ruined his plans almost completely, as well as got him into a tricky situation.





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To my dearest friend, Mircea Matusoiu.
> 
> In brightest day and in blackest night - his support kept me going, and  
>  whenever I needed him, he was there for me. And for that you will always  
>  have my eternal gratitude, and I hope we will remain good friends, no  
>  matter what.

The figure watched its reflection in the water. With a little effort, it could see anything, really anything in there. It took only a moment for it to imagine the place without itself, and the water’s surface reflected the perfect starless and moonless night sky. It was of a color somehow different from black, but any observer wouldn’t be able to place what was so different about it.  
It was easy to forget oneself in this place, to melt into the background, becoming one with the everlasting night, with the dirt path on the ground and with the eerie stone arch over it. Yet there existed hope, the hope for a better tomorrow. But the worst thing about hope and this place – was that tomorrow never came.  
The figure staggered back on its feet at the pool of water, and paced to the stone arch. It perfectly knew, how futile its movements were, but still extended a hand and touched the stone. It was cold as ice, but the figure stubbornly refused to withdraw its hand, no matter how unpleasant it was.  
It remembered.  



	2. You Don't Know Me

Click.  Puff.  Click.  Beep.  A shaky hand reached for a huge porcelain cup under a coffee machine; the hand belonged to a young man, wearing blue pajamas with stars, wizard hats and magic wands.  His face was a rather ordinary one, with blue eyes and just a tiny bit of freckles on his cheeks, small nose and a red mark on his forehead, in a strange zigzag shape.  His looks have to be given credit though, as, despite his real age, at present he looked barely sixteen. 

A sound of door closing somewhere.  The young man didn’t waste any time, and after taking a few sips, left the cup on the kitchen table and ran back to his room.  As soon as he made it there, he took one end of the dusty round carpet shaped like a flower, and in one swift motion turned it upside down, revealing a black pentagram on the underside.  This rapid air movement caused a couple of used matches and an empty lighter to fall from the small nightstand near his double bed.

But he didn’t mind, and in one fluid motion dove under it.  He emerged shortly, the color of his pajamas gaining a grayish hue from a thin layer of dust covering him head to toe, as he was holding another lighter in his right hand (just like the empty one lying in the corner), a small box of crayons in the other, and a dirty polyethylene bag of wax candles by its corner with his teeth.

He then hurriedly proceeded to put the candles on the pentagram.  Needless to say, they refused to stand, and the young man swore quietly, as he grabbed the lighter and, melting their bottom sides, put them on every intersection and corner possible.  Some still fell, and he had to repeat the procedure with those again.

As soon as he was finished, the young man realized, he had forgotten his book on the bed, and effectively cut himself from it.  Swearing a little louder, he walked there and back again across the carpet, knocking a few of the candles down in the process.  Quickly opening the correct page, he then started to copy the symbols from the book with green crayon to the different sections of the pentagram.  Just as he was about to finish, he spotted those few knocked candles, and, with a sigh, put them back into upright position.

He paused, overlooking the room.  The black pentagram with green symbols and ordinary, yellow-white candles looked impressive.  Huh, he never thought that color choice would look so good.

Still holding the book close to his eyes, he started to read the spell in Latin.  Nobody knows, why you had to summon demons in Latin (and that’s what he was about to do), and he wasn’t about to start asking such questions.   The tricky part was that he had to light all the candles while reading the spell, and that was further complicated by the fact that he had wasted all the matches to make the pentagram.  And anyone who tried to light a vertically standing candle with a lighter would know that this was a little awkward, so he had to read the spell really, really slowly.  Upon lighting the last candle, he pronounced the last words of the spell in a patter, as he, with his slow reading, was a little behind his motions.

“None of this went according to plan!” he thought, as he waited for the spell to reach Hell.  It didn’t take long, and the flower-shaped carpet lit with the red glow that was seemingly coming from the very fabric itself.

“Azkabal, the fifteenth demon of sloth, I summon you before myself!” he shouted, and, as if obeying his command, the only window in his room burst open, letting in a breeze of unusually cold air for the spring day outside.  The pentagram exploded with smoke, and he coughed.

As soon as the smoke started to clear away, he saw something he definitely didn’t expect.  Lying in the middle of the carpet in his room was a most beautiful, red-skinned woman he had ever seen.  Well, he hadn’t seen many red-skinned women before.  Not one actually.

Her full lips, shiny black with lipstick (“Do they even have lipstick in Hell?” a thought raced through his mind) looked especially gorgeous, when they parted to reveal flawless rows of white teeth with extended canines, abnormally long for a human, but still pretty short for a vampire; small and somehow cute nose along with thin yet perfectly shaped eyebrows accentuated the eyes well.  And what kind of eyes were they! You could stare in these eyes for days and weeks, months and years – an eternity even; it was like looking into the heart of a volcano – bright sparks of yellow and orange swirled, bursted, died and were constantly re-ignited in the deepest ocean of pure black void.  Small, barely visible rings of white still gave away to any observer where the owner of the eyes was looking at the moment.  Her bob cut hair was of the same black color as her lips and eyebrows, and two dark-brown, sharp, yet small, slightly rounded horns protruded from under it.

The lucky (Or unlucky? It was hard to tell at this point) summoner gulped, as he caught himself staring.  Shifting his gaze, he became even more restless, as he looked at her body.

Without speaking of any particulars, her body looked amazing.  Perfectly shaped lissome legs ended in small feet, with thin spikes sticking out of her heels, by the looks of them – of same material as her horns.

And she was stark naked.  But you had to give it to the young man – he kept his composure quite well, his only reaction being a couple drops of sweat racing down his temples.

“Who… Who are you?” he stammered.  He obviously made a mistake; maybe he read the wrong spell? Wait, no, then the summoning wouldn’t have worked.  He couldn’t summon the wrong demon, could he? Besides, maybe this wasn’t so bad after all…

Moving slowly, cat-like, she stretched her back, causing her summoner to gasp, then turned her head to him, blinked her magnificent eyes in the same slow manner and gently as whisper, said in a deep, husky voice:

“Idiot.”

The young man went wide-eyed.  Just what were you supposed to say in circumstances like these?

“Are you Azkabal, the fifteenth demon of sloth?” he managed.

“Listen, kid,” she said and bit her lip, while swaying her hair to the side with her right hand, “Do I look like I am?”

“You demons can change shape!” he declared as he stuck a finger at her accusingly. He wished he was as sure of his words as he tried to look.  However, she nodded at that.

“True.  But do you think male demons would still be looking like that when summoned?” she queried, raising an eyebrow.

“How would I know?” the young man replied, “You’re my first… demon!”

“Is that so?” the corner of her mouth curved in smile just for a second, “Okay, let me tell you then – I am not Azkabal.”

“How could I have made a mistake? I’ve been planning this for months! Okay, stay calm, stay calm.  I need information, and if she can’t help me – I need to get her out of here as soon as possible!” he thought, “On second thought, it would be a good idea to get her out of here anyway.”

“So what hun?” she said, nonchalantly throwing one leg over the other, “What was it you wanted a demon for?”

“But you’re not a demon of sloth,” the young man said.

“Well, I’m sure we can come to some sort of agreement,” she said, winking at him, and then added, after letting out a long sigh, “You are quite a handsome young man…”

Despite a show she was putting for him, he turned away.

“It doesn’t matter,” he whispered through gritted teeth, his hands clenched into fists.

“Now listen here, you,” she said in a different tone, “Lonely loser! You should be grateful I even tried to make a pact with you, only kings and warlords got that honor before!”

“What do you even know about me, to call me names?” he said as he turned back to face her.  Instead of a small man in blue pajamas, there was now a man with steel in his voice and piercing stare in his eyes.  He was still wearing the same pajamas however, but now he wore it in a much more dignified and proud manner.

“Well, happy people don’t summon demons,” she said with unladylike snort, “Besides this place doesn’t look like a palace or a temple.”

“Well, I-” he started and stopped, when he heard noise outside.  A distinct beep of a car alarm being set.

“Oh no,” he broke out in cold sweat, “I will talk to you later!”

He swiftly grabbed his book from the floor nearby.

“ _Priinceps gloriosissime cælestis militiæ,”_ he read quickly.

“Not gonna work,” she put in, yawning lazily, “The one for me should be somewhere at the end.”

“ _Sancte Michaël Archangele, defende-”_ he stopped reading, looking at her wide-eyed “Wait what?”

“To banish me you need a different chant, asshole,” she said and flared her nostrils.

“Wait, you actually want me to banish you?” he said, amused.

“You think I wanna stay here?” it was her turn to show him her back now.

“But I don’t know which one it is,” he whined, and shook visibly as the door closed somewhere.

“Peter!” a loud female voice called somewhere in the house.

“Crap!” he said, trying to swear as quietly as possible.

And there would probably be no story to tell, if he hadn’t made one grave mistake.  He stepped into the pentagram and pushed her out of there towards the other end of the room, to his wardrobe.  She turned her face to him, her eyes so wide in amusement that they looked like giant yellow gemstones, her mouth open in astonishment.  But he would have none of it.

“Hide, now!” he ordered as he pushed her towards the closet.

“What can be so scary, that-” she hissed as he shoved her inside the wardrobe.

“Mom,” he said, and closed the wardrobe door, despite her protests.

 “Peter, be a dear and help your dad with the bags,” a voice could be heard right outside the room.

“Not a sound, and don’t even think about going out, you hear me?” Peter whispered threateningly at the crack in the wardrobe doors.  He quickly went to the middle of the room, picked up the rug and turned it upside down, in order to hide the pentagram; he was not mindful about all the candles still on it, and they ended up everywhere in room – in the corners, on nightstand and bed, even under it.  Without even a backwards glance at a chaos in his room, he went out.

He wasn’t away for too long, and soon came back, this time wearing a puffer coat over his pajamas.  He quickly made his way to the wardrobe.

“Stay there just a little more, please,” he said.  He didn’t sound so sure this time.  She wondered if he, after having some time to think, began to understand what really happened.  Shortly, there were quick footsteps outside the room, and she could see a woman entering.  First impression was of a happy… ball.  She was short, not exactly fat, but rather plump, red-cheeked and with a lot more freckles on her face than Peter; and she was smiling. 

“Oh dear, Peter, what happened here?” she asked her son.  Her smile didn’t look like anything special apart from the fact it seemed to be as important as any other her feature – without any doubt you could say she carried it everywhere she went and could hardly be seen without it.  Right now however, she tried to look at her son with a serious expression, who, after adopting a sheepish look on his face, replied with a cunning lie.

“I was just practicing to make a surprise for Mike’s birthday,” he said nonchalantly, “Did you know that it’s a torture to use the lighter for candles? Matches are way faster and more convenient…”

“Silly boy,” she replied, patting him on the shoulder, and instantly put her smile back on, “These candles are way too big to put them on the birthday cake, besides, I was thinking of ordering one of those candles in shape of numbers, so as to spare everyone the trouble of counting them.  Now, be a good boy and clean this mess up, and come to dinner – mommy’s bought steak today!”

Halfway to the door she stopped and turned back at him, her expression serious again.

“I called Mr. Renfield, but he said they don’t need more employees.  I trust you are still searching for a job?” she inquired, trying to look Peter in the eyes.

“Yes, mom,” Peter replied, avoiding her gaze.

“Good! It does a man no credit to live off his parents at the age of twenty-four, so keep searching,” she put her smile on again, and marched out of the room.

Peter wiped the sweat from his forehead, and crash-landed on his bed.  There he was lying, a vacant expression on his face, when he felt something lightly touching his hair.  At first he just extended a hand and tried to grab whatever it was, but didn’t find anything.  Then, when same thing lightly touched his thumb, he turned his head and startled.

“Oh, it’s you,” his expression became softer and more tired, “I didn’t hear you coming out.”

“I didn’t,” she said.

The demoness from earlier was squatting beside his bed, a small feather in her hand, her black fingernails gleaming as she tickled him with it.  She looked different now, for one, she was shorter and generally smaller, her facial features also became more crowded on her face.  From sexy seductress she now looked like a teenager, a teenager with horns, tail, and red skin.  Her naked form was concealed under a gray t-shirt which was too big for her, and reached halfway to her thighs.

“Is that supposed to be a lightning?” she said, as she tickled the red zigzag mark on his forehead.

“No, it’s a ‘Z’” he replied, “My nephew, Mike, hit me with a corner of his alphabet board full of plastic letters after he went bankrupt playing monopoly with me.”

“You, humans, never cease to amaze me,” she mused.

Peter turned away from her.

“Why?” he groaned.

“What exactly do you mean?” she asked.

“Why were you summoned instead of Azkabal?” he clarified.

“Oh, well,” she paused, gathering her thoughts, and explained “It’s this new idea most of the succubi agreed to.  Since the population on Earth grew so dramatically in recent years, we were summoned non-stop, to cater to sexual desires of… Let’s just say, displeased part of rapidly increasing male population.  While it was good for our business, most of us got bored and overworked, and wanted to go back to the good working hours we used to have before.”

“So you switched places with less popular demons, is that it?” Peter tried to guess, and raised his head to look at her.

“In a nutshell, yes.  Do you know when was the last time someone summoned Azkabal, for example?” she asked, studying her fingernails, and not waiting for an answer, looked at Peter again seriously and said “Five hundred years ago.  While I was summoned over ten times each day.”

“Wow, I had no idea,” Peter admitted, letting his head fall back on the bed.

“Why did you need Azkabal anyway?” she asked him, as she resumed tickling him with the feather.

“Did you hear that little piece about finding a job when my mom was here?” Peter answered her question with a question, and he too didn’t wait for a reply “I hoped that in the name of sloth, he could do something about it.”

“You don’t want to work?” she allowed a tiny bit of disgust enter her voice.

“Why should I?!” he lifted his torso from the bed, half-standing half-sitting and, trying to look impressive, spoke loudly “All my life I’ve been working hard, first in school, then in college, don’t I have a right to rest? I believe-”

“Peter, is something wrong?” a distant voice of his mother inquired.

“No mom, I’m just rehearsing!” he shouted, and heard a strange sound.  Turning his head around, he found the source of strange noise – the demoness chuckled.

“What are you laughing at, filthy hellspawn?” he said, insulted by being a laughing stock.  And to whom? A demon!

“You try so hard to conceal my existence from your mom,” she stared him square in the eyes, “Especially considering that you got to live only a few minutes.”

She quietly chuckled again.

“Wh-h-ha?..” Peter shook visibly and looked at her, “What? Why?”

“Silly, you either banish a demon, or you at least leave it in the pentagram,” she explained calmly, but her eyes looked dead serious, at least for Peter “If you do something as stupid as to push the demon out of the circle, it can, for example, rip your heart out just like that.”

She clicked her fingers, and laughed in amusement when he twitched in panic.

“Of course, I’m not as vulgar as that,” she continued, “If I kill you, you automatically become a martyr and your soul will go to heaven.  Instead I’m just going to consume it.”

Her normally yellow eyes became lit with the red glow.

“This won’t hurt… Much,” she said, grabbing him by the shoulders.

Peter, to his vast surprise, found that he couldn’t move at all! She walked around the bed to stand in front him, and lowered her head to his eye-level.

“Oh, don’t look at me with those pleading puppy eyes.  If you really must know,” she lowered her mouth to his ear, “I am truly sorry it came to this.  At least before we had a chance to have some fun…”

She drew back from him and smiled.

“After all, it’s just my job, you understand.  But wait,” her smile broadened “You never had a job, did you? Well, no point in delaying the inevitable.”

He saw her hand glowing with same inner red light like her eyes and in the next moment she reached with it for his chest, her hand going right through his puffer coat as if it weren’t there.

Peter felt her touching his nipple… and nothing.  He turned his head to look at her quizzically and noticed he could move again.  But his surprise was nothing compared to hers. The demoness removed her hand and made a few steps back, her eyes full of disbelief and confusion.  She looked at him, then at her glowing hand, then at him again.

“Who… What are you?” she managed, licking her lips nervously.

“Er-r-r-r,” Peter scratched the back of his head, “A human, I think?..”

“I doubt that,” she replied, and narrowed her eyes at him.  She flourished her hands in some weird pattern in his direction, and a few small yellow lightnings left her fingers, and hit Peter in the chest.  Surprised, he fell on the bed with a few indistinct sounds.  She smiled.

“Hey, what was that for?” Peter said as he lifted his torso and raised an eyebrow in her direction, “It tickles, a lot actually.”

A smile left her face.

“I don’t understand!” she declared and turned away from him to stare at the wall.

“Women…” sighed Peter and sat on the edge of the bed, and spoke quietly to himself “Okay, think what to do with her...  Think!”

He rubbed his forehead for some time, while she was still standing there, studying the wallpaper pattern.

“What’s your name?” he inquired, after the silence became rather uncomfortable.

She gazed at him with mixed expression, which somehow combined the fear of a cornered animal, curiosity and that special kind of resentment, unique for females everywhere.

“Vallarixia,” she replied after a long pause, “But friends call me Pixie.”

“I didn’t know demons had friends,” Peter said.

“I didn’t know humans found a way to resist demon magic,” she replied venomously, as if it was his fault he didn’t die or surrender his soul.

“I don’t know what went wrong!” he offered an excuse, but then remembered, that it was after all his soul they were talking about, “Besides, you tried to kill me! And now you blame me it didn’t work?”

She turned up her nose at him.

“At least I was playing by the rules!” she scoffed.

“You tried to kill me!” Peter repeated.

“So what?” she said.

“Well, life’s precious and all that,” Peter waved a hand and furrowed his brows at her.

“Says who?” she asked him again, her arms akimbo.

“Everyone knows that!” Peter almost shouted, and realized his mistake too late.

“Is there someone with you Peter?” a male voice inquired from the depth of the apartment.

“Wait here,” he said, putting his arms palms front in a pacifying gesture, and left the room. 

He came back in about ten minutes, and found that the demoness changed again.  She became even smaller, and was currently bundled in his blanket on the bed with her tail sticking out at an odd angle, reading a fashion magazine while wearing ridiculously big round glasses.  Peter could only wonder where she got them and the magazine from.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he questioned her, clearly displeased, “And what if someone comes in?”

“I will just erase my presence from their mind,” she replied in a childish voice, a lot different from the one she used before, “Besides, you left me here with nothing to do.  I’m not your wife you know to patiently wait until you come back.”

“Fair enough,” he said, as he sighed and landed on the floor beside her, hugging his knees, “So what now?”

“Why do you ask me?” she peered at him from behind her round glasses, “It’s not like it was me who broke the rules.  Twice.”

She looked so ridiculous and cute that he couldn’t help but smile.

“Watcha grinnin’ at?” she squeaked at him.

Peter couldn’t contain himself anymore, and burst out laughing.  She looked at him curiously and patiently waited until he stopped.

“So what can you do? As a demon I mean?” he asked, still smiling.

“A lot of things, depends on what you need,” she replied, and put her index finger on her chin, so she looked a lot like a small nerdy kid.  If nerdy kids could have a red-colored skin, horns and a tail, that is.

“Well, I don’t want to work, you know that already,” he reminded her.

“Hm-m-m-m…” she looked thoughtful, “Come to think of it, I could arrange that…”

“And what would happen?” Peter asked her, “You can’t take my soul, so what else can I trade?”

“Oh, that is not a problem,” she assured him, “The fact that I can’t take your soul doesn’t mean you can’t give it willingly, or trade it.”

“What’s it worth then? Twenty years? Thirty?”

“You misunderstood me,” she clarified in that high-pitched voice “I’m not a demon of sloth to make such a deal, but I can offer a different contract, and as a result, you will be free of work for another… Let’s just say for many years to come.”

“And in the end?” Peter raised his head to look her in the eyes, his expression unreadable “You take my soul, right?”

“Well, in theory, yes,” she conceded “But it will be sort-of up to you when the moment comes.”

“So it can be even eighty years or something?”

“If you last that long,” she grinned, showing the multitude of her shiny white teeth.

“Now wait a moment,” Peter said, and his expression changed, “I remember reading a book about something like that.”

“Oh, you mean **him**.  Yes, there was but one mortal who made such a pact before,” she nodded, and grinned again “He didn’t last.” Her expression became a little sour, “Still, he tricked his way out of going to Hell in the end.”

“What makes you think I won’t do the same?” he inquired.

She bit her lip, managed to free one hand from the blanket, pushed herself closer to the edge of the bed and patted him on the cheek.

“Because he was a man, **the man** ,” she said very gently, “And you are-”

“What?! What am I?” he snapped and she recoiled, “You don’t know me!”

“You are just a kid,” she said, but without much emotion.

“I’m twenty-four!”

“You can be over fifty and still be a kid inside,” she reasoned, adjusting her glasses and wrapping herself in the blanket again.  Once done, she turned her attention back to the magazine, “Suit yourself.  You can still banish me with the appropriate chant, you know.”

“Why?” he asked defiantly after a pause “Why do you offer me such a deal?”

“Well, we got a stalemate here for one,” she answered, “A non-standard situation.  I’m supposed to consume your soul, but I can’t.”

“Lucky me,” Peter put in bitterly.

“Two – because this is interesting and exciting,” for the first time he saw a real emotion, close to a human one on her face, “Imagine working as an aircraft pilot for years, and then you are suddenly offered to pilot a spaceship.”

Her eyes gleamed behind her glasses.

“Just thinking, that for this contract I will have to summon the powers of the fallen angel…” her expression became dreamy.

“What? You mean the big guy himself?” Peter looked at her with disbelief.

“Yes!” she enthused, “I’ve never done this before you know.”

“Fine!” Peter got up, “What are the conditions?”

“Oh, you mean it?” she chirped, freeing herself from the blanket.  “Well, listen,” she started to explain, “You have to say something like ‘This is what I lived for’ or ‘This is what I wanted all along’ in a meaningful way to me, this will signify the end of the deal.”

“Does it mean I have to watch what I’m saying to you all the time?” Peter asked.

“Bah, no, this won’t work if your heart’s not in it,” she continued, “And it works in reverse too – if you really feel that way but don’t say anything, the deal is over as well.”

“How much time do I have?”

“An eternity,” she smiled, looking up at him from the bed “But you will get bored eventually.  Besides, this will be a nice vacation for me, since I will be free of my duties for the duration.”

“So do I sign a contract with blood or something?” Peter was sweating, but mostly because he was still wearing a puffer coat over his pajamas, and the room was quite warm as it was.

“Wow, no, that’s retro-style,” she creeped closer, “We do it with a kiss, especially in the succubi department.”

“Um, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that,” he gestured at her appearance.

“Just give me a moment,” she said with a smirk.

It looked as if a white wave went through her body, and she changed.  In the blink of an eye, the seductress was back, and more.  A pair of giant bat-like leathery black wings extended from her back, and she wasn’t naked this time - and that was quite an outfit.  All of it was made from same, shiny black material, and included a pair of gloves reaching as high as her elbows, a thin stylish choker on the neck, corset-like top, a miniskirt and some sort of strappy sandals with only half a sole, which allowed her to stand on her natural high heels.

Peter’s expression changed into a slightly more sheepish one.  It was after all, what he requested, but…

She didn’t waste any time, and came closer to lean on him, gently stroking the back of his neck with her gloved hand, sending shivers down his spine.  Her smell overwhelmed his senses for a second and was gone the next one – it was a light and elusive, yet sweet scent, reminiscent slightly of vanilla.  In one fluid motion, she wrapped her wings around them, and looked him in the eyes.

“What are you waiting for?” she mouthed, almost without making any sound at all.

For one crazy moment Peter’s world revolved around a pair of glossy black lips; he saw his own reflection staring back at him from those magnificent demonic eyes.  The time itself stopped.

And then he kissed her.


	3. Rabbits and the Undertaker

Like mice in an obstacle course, most humans run through the plastic pipes of childhood and enter the school maze, where you have to navigate entirely by sense of smell – to the unmistakable stench of an adult life, and it doesn’t even matter where you go, because the walls of the maze will inevitably push you towards the exit on time anyway.

The adult life, as it turns out, means freedom, but only the kind of freedom that looks like a rope with which to hang oneself.  The mouse that survived the first two challenges now has a chance to choose the next obstacle course, and the time for decision is limited.  The freedom means choice, but you can’t choose not to choose, not unless you get spotted by one of the many forces that exist in the labyrinth of life.

It takes a special kind of mind to grab a mouse out of the middle of the room, and toss it back into one of the earlier obstacle courses it had already gone through, especially if all the known passages had been changed.

“Stuck inside these four walls, sent inside forever...”

Peter reached with his arm and grabbed his cell phone, automatically turning off the alarm clock.  His sluggish mind instinctively tried to remember his dream.  It was definitely something to remember – he could recall feeling very comfortable… in someone’s company? Dang it, dreaming about girls again.  He couldn’t remember what she looked like, besides, he didn’t try very hard.  What good would it do anyways? Dreams mean nothing to the real world, right?

He got out of bed.  At first he thought that his room somehow got smaller.  But no, there was the cupboard, there were the posters of his favorite bands, there was his bed… But where did the nightstand go? And the wardrobe? And instead of one big window there were two smaller ones.  And the room in fact **was** smaller!

He experienced a sinking feeling in his stomach.  It was his room, but the old one, in the apartment building in the city, not in the house their family owned now.  Panicked, he ran out of the room, through the hallway and into the bathroom.  He was breathing heavily after turning the lights on and taking a look at himself in the mirror.

He saw his own face, but slightly smaller and ravaged by acne.  He sat on the toilet in shock, trying to come to terms with what evidently happened.  The alarm signal! It was the old one as well, as he remembered that he was waking up to ‘Running with the Devil’ for a few years now.

A knock came on the door. 

“Peter, would you like me to pack you sandwiches for lunch at school?” asked the unmistakable voice of his mother.

“Yes please!” he replied, trying to sound casual.  He decided to finish his business in the bathroom, and, shortly returning to his room, got dressed.

“Peter, I brought you the shi-” his mother started speaking, as she entered the room.

He didn’t expect her to look that different from her future self.  Her hair wasn’t tied in a bun, and she looked… Well, slimmer.  Her smile was ever-present though, yet somehow less habitual and more sincere.

“Dear, that’s casual clothes,” she explained patiently, and waved her hand with a shirt in front of him, “You want to look pretty on your first day, don’t you?”

“Yes, mom,” he agreed with her.  First day? Please no…

“I too would like to see my son pretty on his first day in high school,” she enthused, but each word for Peter felt like another nail driven into his coffin.

He obediently put on his shirt, took his bag, and went to the kitchen for breakfast.  Dad was reading a newspaper, a sight Peter hadn’t seen in a very, very long time.

“Morning,” dad said, without looking up.

“Good morning, dad,” Peter said, and sighed as he sat near the table.  All of it was a little too familiar.

After having breakfast, he packed his stuff and went out.  His auto-pilot reflexes were never gone it seemed, and he could simply turn off his mind and go through the routine relying completely on memory of doing it all long time ago.

September the 1st that year turned out to be on Friday, and he thanked the heavens for that.  He would have whole weekend to sort things out for himself.

Thinking like that he took the elevator to the ground floor of their apartment building, and went outside.  It was a warm sunny day, as if the summer didn’t want to surrender to the fall that was already there, but the light breeze in the air was unusually cool for summer.

As Peter was slowly making his way across the yard, he heard some weird sound behind him.

“Peter! Peter! Wait!” someone was calling him.  He saw a girl running from the nearby building.

“Hmph, that never happened before,” he thought, and became curious.  Maybe this was the key to his unexpected time traveling experience.

As she ran towards him, he managed to get a closer look.  Ordinary beige blouse and violet skirt, blonde hair, sunglasses, a face that could be called pretty with the right kind of makeup.  And he definitely didn’t know her, not now, not in the future.

“It’s me!” she gasped, as she ran closer to him.

“I’m sorry, but do I know you?” Peter asked and raised an eyebrow.

“But it’s me,” she brought herself closer to his ear, and whispered, “Pixie.”

Her hair smelled lightly and sweetly of… was it vanilla?

“Nope, doesn’t ring a bell,” Peter shook his head, and started walking away slowly “Maybe you mistook me for someone else.”

“This is strange,” she said to his back, “Your memory shouldn’t have been wiped of me when you traveled back in time…”

That stopped him.

“But how do you?..” he started.

“Idiot,” she interrupted him, “Come here!”

He turned back and made a couple unsure steps towards the girl.  She rolled her eyes, and went straight to him, and before he knew what’s going on, she kissed him on the lips.  His stare went blank.  In his head, the events of the past (now future) unraveled before his mind’s eye like a movie trailer.

“You…” he managed weakly.

“Yes!” she said.

And in the next moment, he slapped her on the cheek, her sunglasses flying away.

“That wasn’t the deal!” he shouted at her, as she recoiled, “I wanted not to work, and now I’m going to school again?!”

Her lower lip trembled slightly.

“That was uncalled for,” her blue eyes were full of tears, “Do you even know how many people wish to get their youth back?”

“Do **you** even know what I had to go through in school?” he was still shouting, “Did you ever think about asking first?”

“We… You have a chance to change that!” she cried.

“Did I just hear a ‘we’ in there?” Peter held up his finger, and spoke through gritted teeth “There is no ‘we’ and there never will be, you foul demon!”

“You are impossible!” she shouted at him, and let one tear to make its way across her face, but as it went, her eyes changed from blue ones to demonic.  “Idiot,” she said with a sudden power in her voice, “I decide to go on a lengthy and pleasant vacation, and whom do I pick as my companion? This dumb, pig-headed schmuck!”

“What do you even-” he started, but she waved a hand.

“Oh, put a sock in it,” she said and vanished into thin air.

Peter shrugged, and went to the bus stop.

Despite all the delays, he arrived there too early, and sat down on a bench.  “Maybe I can convince her to get me back to the future and call off the deal,” he thought.

“I’d like to see how you manage that,” a voice said next to him, and he jumped in surprise.  She was there, sitting next to him, and this time she didn’t bother concealing her demonic features, but the outfit changed to a thin brown coat, and a headscarf, along with the sunglasses he saw before.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Peter hissed, “You’re reading my mind now?”

“Only the things at the top of your head,” she said, without looking at him.

“And I thought you went away for good, why are you stalking me now?” he looked around nervously, but no one was paying them any attention.

“No.  I came back to tell you something important,” she explained “Don’t get on this bus.  You’ve got enough time, I made sure of that.”

“Why?” he asked her defiantly.  He enjoyed the confidence it gave him, as if he was using his favorite trump card.

“Because that was exactly what you did last time,” she turned her head slightly, “You could change a lot if you didn’t do it now.”

“But that’s where I met Ted, my only friend through all the high school,” Peter countered.

“Ten minutes ago you told me you hated it,” she replied, “And you know what? I laid it out before you.  If you want things to be as they were – fine! Get on that bus, I’m not going to stop you.”

She vanished into thin air again, maybe a little too dramatically this time.  He sat on the bench for a minute or a little more, lost in thoughts.  He knew Ted well enough to become his friend anyway, what has he got to lose?

As if obeying some command he got on his feet, and marched in the direction of school.  That was a thing about his decision making process – his subconsciousness would dare him to make a decision minutes or even hours before he finished thinking it through.  Some would even call it courage, but he considered it to be reckless and rash, but couldn’t do anything about it.

As soon as he saw the little green man, Peter ambled across the street.  He felt stupid obeying **her** , but after all, it was he who made a decision.  Thinking like that, he was about to turn the corner, when something heavy hit him in the back.  He would’ve landed face-down on the pavement, if he hadn’t put up his hands to soften the fall.  He heard a soft cry and the rustling sound of papers scattered by the wind.  One such paper landed in front of his face, it read ‘Department of Human Resources, application form №283/06’.  He shifted his weight to the other hand, and picked up the document.

“I’m terribly sorry!” Peter heard a girl’s voice behind him, “You’re not hurt are you?”

“Just a few scratches on palms, nothing too serious,” he got up, and with the small flourish offered her the paper, using this as an excuse to get a better look at her.  She had loose dark brown hair, a face with an almost perfect, straight-edge nose, turned-up just a little, big grey eyes made to look even more defined through clever use of eyeliner, and small ears with quite nice looking earrings. 

She in turn looked at him, pressing a messy bundle of papers to her chest.  The precious moment was however entirely ruined by a sudden gust of wind, which tore more papers from her grasp and scattered them around.

“Please help,” she cried, “Get them, quick!”

It took some time to get all the papers back, but they managed it and she hid them in the small shoulder bag she was carrying.  Unlike Pixie, who smelled light (and possibly, natural, Peter thought) of vanilla, this girl smelled quite strong of perfume.  It seemed the smell was coming partly from her clothes, which consisted of a dark blue vest over white blouse and short skirt of same color as vest, with the mentioned shoulder bag now hanging at her side.

“So, you’re applying for a job, eh?” Peter tried to start a conversation.

“You took a look at the papers, then?” she said, “No, I work part-time in HR department of one company, and just went to pick-up work for the weekend.”

“Oh,” was all Peter managed.

A yellow bus went past them.

“Damn it, I’m gonna be late for school!” he said, starting to run, and waved a hand at a girl, but she disappeared.  Turning his gaze forward he saw her running after the bus, just a few paces ahead of him.

“I.  Am.  Late.  Too!” she shouted sideways as they dashed alongside each other.

Of course, they could not outrun the bus, but the school wasn’t that far away.

“A-And I thought meeting a girl like that on a street happened only in the movies, or to o-other people,” Peter thought, his thoughts felt like coins inside a tin can, bouncing in his mind with each step, “Maybe… Maybe I simply missed the o-opportunity the first time?”

“We made it!” she said, as they slowed down near the iron school gates, which were wide open.  The alley near the school’s perfectly white concrete wall fence looked nice, as the shadows from the trees protected them from the merciless sunrays.  To run around in a three-piece suit was one thing, but running in a three piece suit in the sunlight would’ve been a torture.

“Let’s just catch our breath before going in,” Peter gasped.

“Agreed,” she nodded.

They were standing in the shadow; the girl leaning with her back on the concrete wall while Peter was balancing himself on a nearby tree trunk with his hand.

“I didn’t know you studied at my school,” Peter said, after a pause, “I thought… Eh, never mind.”

“That I’m a college student or something?” the girl showed him her smile, “A friend of my mother’s works in HR department, so when she said she needed an extra pair of hands, we both thought – why not?”

“Oh,” Peter had a vague idea that he replied in a similar way not long ago.

“What’s your name?” she said as she cocked her head, still smiling lightly.

“Talley, Peter.  And yours?”

“Andrews, Melinda, a pleasure to meet you,” she offered him a hand, “Shall we go now?”

Barely believing his luck, he took her hand, and, smiling shyly at each other, they went through the school gate together.

The central school alley was full of first year students, ‘freshmen’ as they were called, and gawkers – composed mainly of their parents, friends and other relatives; also present were the representatives of student council and various clubs, including sport teams.  The students for the most part, could be divided in two categories – the confident ones, who wore fake smiles on their faces and tried to look ‘involved’, and the worried, ‘rabbit’ ones – who were trembling, nervously laughing at the jokes of confident ones and mostly behaving in a passive way – that is, waiting for things to happen **to them**.  Taking into consideration that most of them looked at their best (it was their first day after all), the ‘rabbit’ similarity was even stronger.  And of course, there were those who didn’t fit into the said classification, there are always people like that, each one with their own story.

You could say Peter belonged into this category.  The first time, he definitely belonged to the ‘rabbit’ guys, but the second time things weren’t as scary and he knew everything that was going to happen, besides, he already made an acquaintance with a pretty girl.  Maybe, just maybe, this time things will be better…

“You don’t mind that people may think we are dating or something?” Peter just couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

“Well, I owe you at least a flashy entrance for helping me with those papers,” she winked at him, “Don’t worry!”

“What if she’s Pixie in disguise?” he thought suspiciously.  “Nah, doesn’t look like it – too much effort involved, besides, I don’t think that studying in school is her idea of **fun**.” He could really picture Pixie lying on a beach, drinking some brightly-colored cocktail with a tiny umbrella and a slice of lemon, maybe even in the company of someone who, in his mind’s eye, looked somewhat like a cross between Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt; his good looks and toned abs made Peter hate him on sight, until he stopped himself and thought “Why am I even jealous of her? She tried to kill me, after all.”

“Melinda! Over here!” one of the girls to the left waved a hand with a paper in it, as if it was a flag.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you later,” Melinda lightly touched his shoulder and went to her friends.

Peter started to say something, but thought better of it.  He had other things to do – he needed to find Ted and talk to him before the Undertaker made an appearance.

He went to the shady spot near the front gate, where they stood after becoming acquainted in the bus.  This time, there were three other guys there; Peter didn’t know any of them.  He wondered exactly how different this timeline was going to be.

Looking around, he saw Gregory Collins, his future classmate standing not far with his arms folded.  Next to him, he saw a couple of other guys and a guy in green jeans, whose face he couldn’t see, but in whom he instantly recognized Ted.  Now, came the tricky part, he had to come up with something clever…

“Theodore Patterson, if I’m not mistaken?” he said, as he made an approach from behind and extended a hand for a handshake, and introduced himself “Talley, Peter Talley.”

“I don’t think you fit the role of a secret agent,” said one of the guys near Ted, “With a face like that I mean…”

Peter almost forgot what it was like to be a kid.  He instinctively acted like an adult, and that, of course, didn’t quite fit with the surroundings; some part of him became terrified that he didn’t know how to communicate with his peers anymore.  The rest of him, of course, didn’t care.  Ted, however, shook his hand.

“You heard about me?” he inquired cheerfully.

“Of course not,” Peter thought, but instead decided to say “Was it your article about using cheat engines in one of the computer gaming magazines, about three years ago?”

“Why, yes,” Ted beamed, Peter could hardly remember him being so happy, “Did you find it helpful?”

“Immensely,” lied Peter.  He did use it before in the past version of future, but not yet at this point.

 From here on it went smoothly.  Peter finally relaxed in the presence of his friend, and simply waited for the Undertaker to come.

 ‘The Undertaker’ was a nickname given to the school Principal, when their company saw him with the shovel during the Spring Cleaning week on the second year of study; the nickname stuck, because he always wore the three-piece suit, and his jaw along with almost non-existent chin was set in such a way, as if he was about to say “I’m so sorry for your loss” any moment now.  The nickname stuck and of course since then, seeing him was considered bad luck, and talking to him – even more so; “He’s a dead man, the Undertaker came for him” – that meant someone was in deep trouble.  Once one of the girls even called him “Mr. Undertaker, sir” by accident, gathering a round of laughter from the class.  She managed to get off the hook by saying she was tired and watched too much wrestling recently; the nickname similarities were purely coincidental however.

 It didn’t take long, as a snappy boy nonchalantly dragged a microphone from somewhere behind the crowd of people surrounding the representatives of student council, to position it at the top stair near the main entrance to the school.  As if appearing out of nowhere, the Undertaker materialized from the nearby crowd, and after a short cough, went on with his short speech, and invited all the first year students to the auditorium.

 Peter tried to find Melinda with his eyes, but gave up – there were just too many students, and the spot where he saw her talking to a friend was empty now.  He stuck with Ted for now.

 As they entered auditorium, Peter automatically fell on the chair where he was sitting the first time he was here – but this time Ted decided not to stay with him.  Feeling a little embarrassed, he was even more surprised to notice, that the two chairs, which he picked for himself and Ted were surrounded by vacant spots on all sides.  He shrugged and sat down.

 “Idiot,” he heard from the nearby chair, and startled, jumped to his feet, “Pf, I thought by now you’d get used to it.”

 “Why did you call me an idiot just now?” he whispered.

 “Because you didn’t trust your senses,” Pixie explained, in a tone of voice as if speaking to a slow person, “Do you really still believe in random encounters after the situation with the bus?”

 He simply stared at her venomously.  She looked like herself, red skin and all, except she was teen-sized again.

 “Oh by the way, you’ve done real smooth there with her, whatshername,” she tried to conceal the condescending spirit these words were spoken in, but didn’t try hard enough, and continued slowly “Melinda.  Did you know you could’ve gone to a date with her later today if you weren’t so thick in that skull of yours?”

 The Undertaker in the meantime started his introductory speech.

 “Shut up!” Peter hissed, “If you can’t take me back home then get out!”

 “Back to the future?” she said and laughed at her own joke.

 Peter didn’t reply, viciously staring at the Undertaker and ignoring Pixie.

 “Is that a ‘yes’? Is that your heart’s desire? Is that what you wish for?” she said, almost singing the words.

 “Are you trying to push my buttons?” he whispered to her.

 “Silly mortal, you-” she started.

 “No, you listen to me,” he raised his voice a little, but still kept it a whisper, “I don’t know what is going on in your perverted demonic head, and I don’t want to know! But I know for a fact that I can name a hundred, nay, a thousand better things you could be doing, rather than keep stalking me!”

 The image of Tom Cruise – Brad Pitt hybrid crossed his mind again, and he shivered mentally; but Pixie looked… sheepish?

 “I was just curious, about how you were doing,” she said with an unusual ring to her voice, “Thought you might be a little lonely.”

 “I don’t need your pity, demon, and in fact, I don’t need to go to school!” he took his phone out, and pretended he was talking on it, finally not bothering about what it looked like.

 “Would you feel better if I were studying with you?” she asked lively.

 “No!” he cried, and laughed after imagining it “You wouldn’t last a day...”

 “We bet?” she looked him in the eyes.

 “Okay, what’s at stake?” he said, still holding the phone with one hand and scratched his ear with the other, thinking, “Let’s say… You stay here for a month, and if you leave, cry or break down in any other way – I win.  The winner gets…”

 “A wish?” she intoned, and quickly added, “But no funny business, no things like ‘I want the contract terminated’ or ‘my soul back’; just something I can do.”

 “And also stuff like ‘Give me your soul’ or ‘Come with me to Hell’.  And,” Peter said “Things like ‘Find a job’, ‘Earn money’, ‘Get all A’s on all exams’ won’t do.”

“Fine!” Pixie bit her lip, “It’s a bet then.”

They exchanged handshakes.  Peter couldn’t help but notice how soft the skin on her small hand felt.  He could even try to pretend she wasn’t an evil creature that wanted his soul.

It took only a split second when he wasn’t looking for her to change appearance again.  She adopted almost the same look she had in the morning, except changed a few colors and added some makeup.  Her skirt and blouse were now both of the same sky-blue color, and she decided to turn her long loose strands of hair to raven black, yet it was of slightly different hue, than her natural (if it could be called that) hair.  Come to think of it, Peter never really knew which one was the ‘real’ one, or if such a thing as ‘real’ could be applied to demons.  He should’ve read more about them before trying to summon one.  But of course, the Book! How could he forget?..

In the meantime, the Undertaker and other teachers were finished with their speeches, and declared that those students, who specifically preferred to get into science or arts class, should come closer to the stage and vote on their preference.  Not the smartest move, as a huge crowd of freshmen amassed near the few tables under the podium, where a couple very nervous students were busy with the lists.  Should he sign up again for the science class? He would at least know everything already, how hard could it be the second time?

“You should try the one you haven’t tried before,” Pixie interrupted the train of Peter’s thoughts.

“Why?” he didn’t think long before choosing his favorite response.

“Idiot,” she retorted with her favorite one as well, “My little advice with the bus has taught you nothing?”

“I can’t rely on your judgment all the time, can I?” Peter said in a more neutral tone of voice, “Otherwise my soul might be already as good as yours.  And your vacation - gone in a blink of an eye.”

“Good point,” she conceded, and continued, “Now, about our bet…”

“What about it?”

“Where would you prefer me then?” Pixie inquired and crossed her legs, “In your class, where you can watch me closely, or in different ones?”

The question wasn’t an easy one for Peter.  On one hand, he would prefer **not** having her around, on the other – he could watch her progress more closely if she was around, and of course arranging a couple misfortunate accidents would be easier if she was in his class, increasing the odds of winning the bet.  Assuming the game was not rigged from the start, and he knew it was.  She was a demon after all, cheating was expected of her, but he had a few tricks up his sleeve as well.

“So?” she cocked her head at him.

“Keep your friends close, and your **enemies** ,” he stressed the words in a meaningful way, “ **Closer**.”

“I know a little about it,” she awarded him with a crooked smile, “Let’s go.”

The stream of students at the foot of the scene by that time subsided, and they had no trouble getting closer to a girl, who looked as if she had been carrying papers around all her life, and already got used to feeling tired.  “There goes nothing,” he thought, and put his signature in the ‘Arts’ column, stepping aside to let Pixie sign the paper.  She put her signature in the ‘Arts’ column as well.

“Beatrice Summers?” Peter inquired, as they went back to their seats.

“Beatrice – Trixie,” she shrugged, “A most fitting human name I can think of.”

“But what of the girl?” he asked quietly.

“What girl?” Pixie looked at him quizzically.

“The one you have signed for!”

“Oh, that,” she said, looking a little embarrassed, “She never existed, I simply altered reality so they would have me in their list.”

“What is stopping you from altering reality to win the bet then?” Peter queried, his face a mask of stone.

“I would never-” she started and then stopped herself, and raised her head to look at him, “Nothing.  You will have to trust me there.”

“ **Trust a demon**?” Peter inquired sarcastically, “Why sure, it’s a good way to lead a very happy and a **very** short life.”

She stared at him unblinking.

“What else have you got then?”

He didn’t reply.  He didn’t know what to reply.

                                                                    #

After the auditorium, their assigned teacher, Mr. Caldwell, led them and the other students to their classroom, for another introductory speech.  Peter was surprised to find Ted among other students in their class.

“He followed you, just like the previous time,” Pixie whispered.

“He never told me about it,” Peter replied.

“Why would he?” Pixie scratched her chin, “Besides, I don’t think it matters to him much.”

“Huh?” Peter requested clarification.

“Think about it, my dear idiot,” she explained and rolled her eyes, “He’s your average dude who has no idea about what he wants from life, much like you are.  And that guy he met today signed for ‘Arts’, why not sign there himself? Company is better than being alone, right?”

“What do you mean when you say I have no idea what I want from life?” as expected, Peter heard only the part of her speech which touched upon his ego.

“I mean just look at yourself,” Pixie gestured with her hand, “Half the time you are lost in thought, and when your thoughts are here, you behave like a constipated old man.”

“No I’m not!” Peter realized how childish his protest sounded, and resigned “Look, just leave me alone.”

“It’s not me who is always asking questions,” she shrugged, “Just saying.”

She, however, granted his wish, and left him alone, choosing a seat at the very front, near the teacher.  Peter always liked his place in the old classroom, and he picked the same one again, almost at the end of the row and near the window.  Ted sat behind him.

“Hey,” he felt a tap on his shoulder, “I saw you signing for the ‘Arts’ class, and decided to come along as well.  Is it true what they say that there’s less homework here?”

“All I know is that there’s a lot of it in science class,” Peter replied.  They didn’t have this conversation before.

“She seems nice,” Ted decided to change topic, and nodded in the Pixie’s direction “I saw you two talking.  Is she a friend of yours?”

“More like a rival really,” Peter glanced back at Ted, “She’s not all she seems.”

“Most people are,” reasoned Ted.

Mr. Caldwell was very different from Mr. Douglas, a teacher they would have had if they had gone to a science class.  Mr. Douglas projected an aura of quiet confidence and knowledge – it would seem, he could solve anything at all, from math (which was his specialty) to chemistry and physics.  Mr. Caldwell on the other hand was his opposite – he openly admitted in his introductory speech that he may not know everything, and on most questions they are better off digging for knowledge themselves; a school’s vast library of paper, audio and digital books along with internet access was at their disposal any time.  Instead, he focused on things like communication, trust and teamwork, which sounded like a load of crap to Peter.  “Yeah, work in team with Pixie, things just couldn’t be better, could they?” he thought, “Well, I brought this upon myself…”

“… and I would like us to become friends over these next three years, so you can ask me anything, and I want you to learn to trust each other.”

“May I?” a red-headed girl sitting at the front, whose face Peter could not see, raised her hand.

“Yes?” Mr. Caldwell beamed.

“Are you married, Mr. Caldwell?” she said, Peter could see the side of her cheek redden visibly.  The question made most girls giggle and gathered more than few snorts from boys.

“Why, no.  You know how they say,” Mr. Caldwell replied graciously, perfectly aware of the test he was being put through it seemed, “If it weren’t for marriage, men would go through life thinking they had no faults at all.”

This gathered another round of laughter from the students, mostly boys this time.  Peter had to give it to Mr. Caldwell, he handled the situation pretty well.  As Mr. Caldwell continued to explain the learning process in detail, Peter found himself slowly dozing off.  The room was warm, and with all the excitement of the day, he felt quite tired.  Trying not to fall asleep, he searched for a distraction and incidentally looked out the window.  At first, he saw nothing beyond quite an ordinary picture of the school yard with scattered groups of people moving about, mostly out of school.  And then he noticed something, felt something.  Someone’s stare.  He looked at the landscape again, and saw it.  There was a girl staring right at him across the entire school yard.  Unmoving, she somehow merged with the landscape, but the more he looked at her, the more defined her features became.  His hair stood on end – she looked familiar somehow, as if she was an old and forgotten friend, but the way she stood there gave him the creeps.  He couldn’t quite make out her face from that distance, but he noticed she had golden blond hair and strange attire, consisting of poorly matching blue sweater and short red skirt, with ordinary brown shoes.

“If there’s nothing else, then that’s it for today, enjoy the weekend,” Mr. Caldwell said, and produced a list, “I have to ask a few of the new students to stay behind, as there seems to have been a mistake with computer systems, and not all of the students got their accounts activated, those are: Beatrice Summers, Peter Talley, Theodore Patterson, Paul Whitman and Maurice Palmer.”

At a mention of his name Peter looked around only to see other students leaving, but when he peeked out the window again the girl was gone.  He just sat there, not quite believing what he had seen.

“Hey, let’s go,” Ted urged him, “What’s the matter?”

“No, nothing, just thought I saw a ghost,” Peter said, as he got up and smiled.

Mr. Caldwell led the remaining students through the school corridors, pointing out the important places.

“This here is our laboratories, where you can actually see with your own eyes the things you study in chemistry, biology and physics classes,” he announced proudly, as they were passing by a couple classrooms with some weird locks on the doors, “Of course, the students who chose science classes will study here more frequently, but let me assure you…”

Pixie was at the head of the procession, closely following the teacher, while Peter was at the very end, trailing behind Ted.  He couldn’t get what he had seen in the window out of his mind.

Shortly, they reached the stairwell, and upon ascending one flight of stairs, they saw another set of classrooms; these however, unlike previous ones, had walls of glass and were full of computers.

“These are our computer classes, all of them are connected to the school’s digital library and Internet, and you are free to use them whenever you need to,” Mr. Caldwell explained, as he led them inside “They are all identical, so when you need to work, you can sit anywhere you like.”

As they got in, a strange face peeked over one of the screens, and smiled broadly at them.  It was a man, who looked a like a typical lumberjack, his long brown tangled hair and beard were a mess, and his outfit, consisting of a baseball cap, plaid shirt and dark blue jeans he was wearing only made things worse.

“That must be the administrator,” Peter thought.

“Charles, how r’ you doin?” he barked in a rough voice at Mr. Caldwell.

“This is the assistant of our system administrator,” Mr. Caldwell explained to the students, and responded, “Quite well, Andrew.  We’re here to see the administrator about those missing accounts.”

“If he’s not the administrator, who is?” lazily thought Peter.

“Yeah, you guys follow me to the server room, in groups of three please, the room is really small,” Andrew addressed the students in monotone.

Pixie and the other two guys made a step forward, Peter and Ted didn’t mind that.  Ted looked around with a mix of dazed and happy expressions; Peter could easily understand that he enjoyed the idea of readily available Internet access anytime he wished.  But Peter himself felt bored and anxious, besides, the computer classes felt too cold for his taste and smelled of plastic.

It didn’t take long for the first group to come back, Pixie’s face was a mask of stone, while the two guys who went with her wore slightly confused and shy expressions.  As Pixie passed by him, Peter raised an eyebrow at her, but she ignored him; he instinctively shrugged.

“Next please,” Andrew said in same monotone voice.  It seemed that it was his preferred way of talking with freshmen.

Peter and Ted followed him through a small white door with a code lock.  Inside was a room, not a small one, but most of it was occupied by all manners of boxes, empty, judging by how dangerously stacked they were.

And in the middle of the room, looking at three screens at once, sitting in the leather chair, with the piece of paper glued to the back of it reading ‘Administrator’, was one of the weirdest girls Peter had ever seen.  She had mostly small features, runny blue eyes, auburn hair and beautifully pronounced chin, which currently moved along with her jaw, as she was eating what apparently was a cookie taken from a plate with a stack of them near the keyboard on the table. 

 “These are the last ones,” Andrew said.

“Ye, ye,” she waved a hand at him dismissively, and he left.  An awkward silence descended.  She clicked a mouse a couple times, pressed the ‘Esc’ key on the keyboard in front of her, and turned to look at them.  Her freckles seemed to look way prettier than Peter’s; she also wore two headsets, one on top of her head and the other one on her neck with microphone sticking out to be directly in front of her mouth.  Her attire turned out to consist from a plain white t-shirt, denim miniskirt and blue sneakers.  A small blue baseball cap was currently on the top of the middle computer screen; picturing her wearing it completed the image.

“Are you going to stand there all day?” she asked.  Her voice sounded quite high, and as they came closer, Peter picked up a strong smell of cinnamon coming from her.  He immediately discovered the source of it, as he saw a steaming cup of hot cocoa on a small table nearby.

“You’re just not what I expected from a system administrator,” Peter tried, and smiled.

“Oh, guys like Andrew may look important and grow beards and puff their chests,” she chuckled, and continued “But at the end of the day when everything breaks down, it’s me who drags their sorry asses out of trouble.”

Peter, still smiling looked at Ted, and was startled at his expression.  Pure bliss was on his face and in his dreamy, glazed eyes.

“Hey, snap out of it,” Peter whispered and lightly punched him on the shoulder, to get his attention, “You’re **staring**.”

Ted closed his eyes, gulped visibly, and opened his eyes again with a slight nod.

“We’re here about the accounts or something,” Peter reminded her.

“Oh, yeah, right,” she pressed a couple buttons and rolled away on her chair, “There you go, whoever of you guys is Peter should enter his new password now.”

Peter thought, and, smiling inwardly, entered ‘Demon2015’, and confirmed his password.  She rolled back, now holding the aforementioned cup of cocoa in her left hand, pressed a few buttons again, and rolled away, this time letting Ted enter his password.

“Are you a student?” Peter asked her nonchalantly, while Ted had his back turned to them.

“Ye, second year, working here part time,” she said cheerfully, her mood apparently boosted by a cup in her hand, “Name’s Alex by the way.”

“Must be boring sitting here all day,” he tried to make a conversation.

“Not really, but I’m always happy to see visitors,” she responded with a smile.

In a moment, Ted was done, and grinning sheepishly, went to stand behind Peter.

“Well, I guess we’ll be going now,” Peter said.

“Later,” she rolled back and was already staring fixedly at something on one of her screens, while vigorously clicking the mouse.

#

“Wow,” Ted kept repeating as they went out of the main school doors.

“You liked her that much?” Peter raised an eyebrow at him.

“Hell yes!” Ted said and pinched him in the belly, “I mean, did you **see** her? She’s amazing!”

“Her name’s Alex, she’s a second year student.  She said she’s always happy to see visitors and my guess is that she’s in science class,” Peter revealed the gathered information and shrugged, “Can’t think of one good reason why she would want to go to the arts class anyhow.”

Ted’s face went from dreamy to amazed, and in a moment he was grinning happily.

“You’re a great friend, you know that?” he exulted, the smile never leaving his face.

“I have my moments,” Peter said and winced at a gust of cold wind.  He suddenly felt very sad and… alone.

He looked around, and saw her again.

“Listen, you go on, I still have a few errands to run,” he hastily told Ted, never tearing his gaze from the figure.

“You alright?” Ted asked, sounding just a little worried.

“I’m fine, really, see you tomorrow, I just remembered something,” Peter tried to sound casual, but had trouble looking the part, afraid that even a blink of an eye will be enough for her to disappear.

“Well, see you later then, thanks again,” Ted waved him goodbye.

But to Peter, only he himself and that figure in the distance existed.  He didn’t know what to think, what to do in such situation.  So his subconsciousness decided for him, and he strode purposefully towards her.


	4. You’re Not the Only One

There are memories people cherish.  There are things they try to forget.  And there are things that constantly try to forget themselves.

“Um, hello,” Peter said awkwardly, as he approached her.

Closer, he could see her face.  It was familiar and yet somehow alien to him.

She moved her head sideways just a couple degrees and her big grey eyes widened slightly.  The change was so small, that it was barely noticeable, but considering that she stood still for at least five minutes (if not a couple hours) it was like seeing a mountain move.

And then she started slowly walking towards him, her expression again becoming a mask of stone.  Peter didn’t know what to feel, on one hand he was curious, but all of that was creepy as hell.  But she was just a girl, what could happen, right? Right?

Wide-eyed, he stared at her, approaching.  She stopped just inches away from him.

“Hello Pete,” she said, barely moving her thin, colorless lips, her voice sending strange echoes inside his head.  It was as if she spoke over great distance, yet right into his head.

He was paralyzed, he couldn’t move; he couldn’t get himself to say anything, all he could do was just stare at her.  The silence went on for too long, and she slowly walked right past him, but stopped a few feet away, facing the school building.

“Did you forget me?” she asked.

It was so long ago, and with his added memories of future now, it felt to Peter like it was in a previous lifetime.  But he didn’t forget.

“I understand,” she said, “It was lo-”

“No,” Peter answered her question, “How could I?”

Silence descended again.

“How is this possible?” Peter thought, and came closer to stand beside her.

“I never thought I’ll see you again,” he simply voiced what was on his mind.

“I was always here,” she said, still not moving, “It’s just that you could never see me… until today.”

A cloud passed, and the sun appeared again, filling the school yard with its warm light.

“How have you been?” she asked him, and turned her face to him.  Small sculpted nose, pale and a little gaunt cheeks; it was weird to see her move, after she was still for so long.

“Mary, I’m,” Peter stammered, and slouched, “In deep trouble.”

“Your own doing again?” she raised an eyebrow.  He simply nodded in reply.

“You haven’t changed at all,” she turned to watch the school again.

“But you did, you’ve grown,” Peter said, “Your cousin told me what really happened.  To everybody else they told you went to live with your grandparents.”

She didn’t reply.

“Tell me, are y-” Peter started, but she spun around and brought her tiny finger to his lips.

“Don’t say it!” she urged, a pleading look in her eyes, “Please, don’t…”

“But you are?..” Peter tried again.

She nodded glumly.

“Can I…touch you?” he whispered and held his breath.

“Give me a minute to prepare,” she closed her eyes, and furrowed her brows.  She stood like that a little, and then suddenly opened her eyes and shouted “Now!”

Peter reached with his hand and touched her cheek; it felt soft, as if it consisted of a thousand microscopic feathers.  He held it for a split second, and then her face contorted in a painful expression, and the pressure on his fingers disappeared, and he saw his middle and index finger sink right through her face.  He hastily removed his hand, and wiped a traitorous tear from the side of his nose.

“I’m sorry!” she echoed inside his head, “It is hard to concentrate, I didn’t try anything like that for a very long time.”

“It’s fine,” he replied, trying not to look at her, a lump in his throat making speech rather painful.

“Your mother awaits the return of her son from his first day at school,” Mary said, trying to sound cheerful, but there was this uncharacteristic ring to her voice.

“Will I see you again?” Peter asked.

“Would you like to?” she answered his question with another question, just like she did many years before.

“Absolutely,” Peter said with a feeling.

“Then you will,” she smiled a crooked smile, and added “When you need me, I’ll be there.”

He made a few steps in the direction of his home, but turned back again.

“See you later, Mary,” he spoke to a thin air.  She was gone.  A rush of warm wind ruffled his hair.

#

He could smell her before he turned the corner.

“Ye, ye, I’m idiot, I know that,” he said, before Pixie could even open her mouth.

She was still looking like a human.

“What took you so long? And where’s Ted?” she inquired, as she started to walk beside him.

“Dunno, gone home perhaps? And to answer your first question,” he replied smugly, “It’s none of your damn business.”

“ **Damn** business is my business,” she said, and added, “I thought I lost you, for some time I couldn’t even sense you anymore.”

“Now that’s interesting…” thought Peter, but instead asked her “Why were you waiting for me?”

“Well, it’s boring to go home alone, I thought you might like some company,” she said, looking down.

“Didn’t I ask you to leave me alone? Besides,” he couldn’t contain his curiosity, “Where are you going, exactly?”

“Your place?” she squeaked quietly.

“My place?!!” Peter exclaimed stopping wide-eyed, “Why? Don’t you have a home or something?”

“You know better than to ask me such questions!” she exploded in turn.

“You know, that’s private space we are talking about here,” Peter tried to explain, “People need it, everybody needs it.  You should at least ask before suggesting something like that.”

“Fine!” she took a deep breath to steady herself, “Can I come?”

“No,” he said and doubled his pace.

“I hate you!” he heard behind.

#

“Mom, I’m home!” Peter shouted, as he closed the front door behind him.

She was already there, wearing an apron.

“So how did it go?” she inquired, smiling.

“Listened to a few boring speeches, made some new friends,” he recounted the events, “Signed for the ‘Arts’ class.  Our teacher, Mr. Caldwell seems to be just the right sort.”

“Peter,” his mom shook her head at him, but still smiled “I think I will never understand you.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Well, you’ve been telling me for months now, how it would be amazing to get into a science class,” she reminded him, “Don’t get me wrong, I’m fine with your decision, a little confused is all.”

She went back to the kitchen.  Peter took off his shoes and followed her.

“It was a last-minute decision, I don’t really know why I did it,” he tried to come up with a convincing lie.  “That smells delicious!”

“Will be ready soon.  Also, I thought of making a pie for your first day,” mom replied while stirring something in a cooking pot, the source of the pleasant smell.

“Please, don’t add vanilla, can’t stand the thing,” Peter lied again.  He simply had enough of Pixie for the time being, and wanted no reminders of her.

“Are you alright with cinnamon then?” mom queried.

“It will do perfectly,” Peter said, and smiled to a memory of Alex and the look on Ted’s face.

#

The rest of the day went quite ordinarily.  They had a decent family dinner when dad came home from work; Peter even forgot how it felt, and now looking at everything through the eyes of his adult self, he could really enjoy these little moments of peace’n’quiet with his family.

He informed his parents that he was planning to go out with his new friends the next day, another blatant lie – he wanted to recover the Book, to try and find as much information as he could about Pixie and that deal he’d signed.  Speak of the devil – all that time Peter tried to stay away from windows, because of the small red figure appearing everywhere – on rooftops and balconies of nearby buildings, throwing him resentful and meaningful stares.  It felt like leaving a stray puppy outside in the thunderstorm, but each time he reminded himself that the ‘puppy’ was in fact a demon who wished to tear his soul out and drag him to Hell.  Besides, it wasn’t raining, the weather was quite pleasant, and so he didn’t feel **too** bad about it.

By the evening he calmed down a little bit and accepted the fact that conversation was unavoidable, and went to the balcony.  The unmistakable whiff of vanilla told him he wasn’t alone.

“That wasn’t very nice,” Peter heard from another balcony nearby.

“You forgot the ‘idiot’ part,” he reminded her, and turned to look at her.

She rolled her eyes.

“I still don’t quite understand why you keep stalking me,” Peter said, watching the sunset, “With your abilities you could be… Anywhere.  I can think of so many nice places.”

She was looking like a small red-skinned kid with horns, currently clad in a fashionable denim suit, consisting of a small vest and jeans, torn in places to look old and ‘rebellious’; a black t-shirt with Che Guevara printed in red and white she wore under the vest only added to the picture.  She was sitting on the balcony’s stone railing, dangling her feet rhythmically.

“It is hard to explain,” she said, in a surprisingly serious and calm voice, looking thoughtfully at the sunset too.

“Try me.”

“Okay,” she took a deep breath, “Our contract binds not only you; it binds me as well.  Whenever I’m not around you, I get this… Itch.  I can do things of course, but there’s one thing I can’t do – it’s relax.  And the whole purpose of my vacation was to get a little rest, you know.”

“What is stopping you from altering the reality to make yourself the owner of the nearby house then?” Peter reasoned, “You can live nicely and still be close to me.”

“You know how a parent might prefer a handmade greeting card for holiday from his child instead of a hundred dollars?” she replied with a question, and tried to explain “Well, take that and multiply the experience by thousands of years.”

“You lost me there somewhere,” Peter rolled his lips inwards thoughtfully.

“Look, I’m not saying that if I alter reality to get myself a sandwich it will taste worse than the real one!” she exclaimed, and continued more calmly “All I’m saying is that for me it will have this invisible ‘fake’ label written all over it.  It’s… Disconcerting.  Makes me feel uneasy.”

“I think I got it,” Peter tried, “What you want to say is that you will prefer a bad sandwich prepared in a normal way to a good sandwich made by your magic?”

“Exactly!” she clicked her fingers.

“Wait here a moment,” Peter dropped a line and went back to the house.  He reappeared shortly with a paper bag and threw it to Pixie, who caught it with an amused expression.

“Wuts that?” she said, holding it as if it contained a bomb.

“See for yourself,” Peter went back to staring at the sunset, “I probably shouldn’t, but what the heck…”

Pixie explored the contents of the bag.  She brought out a few simple bacon sandwiches with one tomato, one small cucumber and a yellow apple.

“Uh,” she suddenly became nervous, “You didn’t have to…”

“What are you supposed to say?” Peter said in funny scolding voice.

“Thank you!” she beamed with a smile.

“Good girl!” Peter said, and they laughed together.

“You know Peter,” she said after they were done laughing, “You’re OK.”

“Well, thanks I guess,” he replied, “But I’m still not sure about you living with me, sorry.”

“That’s fine, the weather is good anyhow,” she assured him.

She paused and sighed.

“There’s also that another thing about the contract…” she let her voice trail off.

“What?” Peter asked, curious.

“I’m not comfortable telling you about it just now,” she said and smiled apologetically, “Let’s just say there’s more to the ‘fake’ label than just the material world.”

They sat there silent, watching the sunset together for some time.  Peter was thoughtful, trying to find some inner peace after one crazy day, while Pixie was busy with the contents of the paper bag.

 At last Peter stopped leaning on the railing and got up, “Good night, Pixie.”

“Ghud night,” she managed while eating one of the sandwiches, “‘Ave a ghud shleep!”

#

Peter woke up half past ten in the morning, and had a cup of coffee.  His parents were already gone shopping, as was customary in their family on Saturday, as popular legend claimed that there are longer queues in the shops on Sunday.

He tried not to think of the events of the past day, and so he got dressed and went out.

The sky was covered with clouds, and wind felt much colder than yesterday, but it didn’t look like was going to rain.  That didn’t stop him from taking a plastic bag with the umbrella inside, even if he didn’t need the umbrella – he would still have something to carry the Book around in.

“Good morning,” came inevitably as soon as he felt the now familiar light smell in the air.

She looked the same as yesterday’s evening; even her pose was the same.  But now she was sitting on a small canopy over the entrance to the apartment building.

“Hello,” Peter greeted her and went on his way.

“Where are you…” she started, but Peter turned a corner, “… going?” she finished, appearing seemingly out of nowhere, leaning on the nearby wall.

“I got some business to do,” he replied.

“Can’t you…” he heard from behind, “…answer the…” from an alley nearby, “…question like a normal person?” she finished sitting on top of the bus stop.

“If you must follow me, than can you at least walk, instead of…” he whispered, trying not to attract attention, “This?”

She jumped off the bus stop roof and gave him a shy smile, “Sorry.”

“And what’s with the getup?” he gestured at her appearance.

“What’s wrong with it?” she inquired.

“Why do you look like that?”

“I don’t know, I guess I like being small,” she shrugged, “What would you prefer me to be? Wait, first say – should I be visible or invisible?”

“Visible,” Peter said firmly, “I don’t want to end up in looney bin talking to ‘imaginary friends’.”

“Fine, any other preferences?” she looked up at him, after nodding lightly, as if making a mental note.

Peter’s fantasy ran wild.  His body was after all of a fifteen-year old and the hormones were there as well.  But entirely different thing was what kind of girls it would be acceptable to appear in public with.  He briefly thought about Melinda and Alex, but discarded the idea, as it would create much confusion if they happened to stumble upon the real ones.  He then thought about his mother, but discarded that thought as a creepy one.  The best thing would be if she looked unique and not very noticeable.

“Hey, remember how you looked yesterday in the morning, before coming to school? Blonde hair and all?” Peter said “That would do.”

She nodded, and clicked her fingers.  A familiar white wave ran over her body, and there she was, just like yesterday.

“You might want to remove the sunglasses, in weather like this they only attract attention,” Peter advised, as he critically examined her.

She took off the sunglasses and dropped them on the road.  They never reached the pavement however, starting to disappear mid-flight and completely gone by the time they should’ve landed.

“Now I get what you meant by ‘fake’ label,” he mumbled.

“Happy now?” she asked.

“Content with your looks, discontent with the necessity of your company,” Peter summed up his thoughts on the matter.

“Oh please,” she sneered.

It didn’t take long for the bus to arrive, and they got inside.  Peter was surprised that she had a bus pass, but said nothing.

“You never replied to my question about where we are going,” she reminded.  They sat opposite each other.

“You’ll see soon enough,” Peter replied absent-mindedly.  He enjoyed sitting near the window and watching things go past.

“But-” she started to speak, and stopped herself.  “You’re no fun,” she complained.

“I’m not here to entertain you,” Peter said, “Be thankful I allowed you to accompany me.”

She didn’t reply and made a face instead, which Peter, of course, ignored. 

The urban landscape outside the window slowly changed to suburban.

“That’s my stop,” Peter said, and got up.  They got off the bus at a small bus stop near a tall chalk-white wall.

“Can I ask you something?” Pixie asked, as they got out.

“I’m listening.”

“Can you please stop treating me like some unwanted luggage?” she stressed, “It’s demeaning and does you no credit.”

“I wonder what treatment you expect,” Peter retaliated with a fake smile, “After trying to kill me.”

“But yesterday, on the balcony, we were doing alright!” she protested.

“I just took pity on a little hobo,” Peter’s smile broadened, “Nothing special.”

“I’m not a hobo!” she raged.

“Is that so?” Peter faked amusement, “Where do you live then?”

“You know quite well!” she pointed a finger at him accusingly, “In Hell, of course!”

“Then why can’t you go to hell?” he said and laughed at his own joke.

“Not funny,” she said in a tone of voice of an indignant child, “I can’t, for the duration of the contract.  That makes sense, it’s supposed to be a vacation, right? If we had never signed our contract, I would have to work now.  Come to think of it, you would as well.”

She made a good point, and Peter stubbornly refused to give her at least that, preferring to keep silent, as he was walking along the wall down the road, with her trailing close behind.

“Here we are,” he said, as they arrived at the big iron gate; a small metal plaque nearby read ‘Eternally Peaceful Cemetery’.

“Really?” Pixie queried.

“Ladies first I guess,” he made a theatrical gesture towards the entrance.

“Nah, you know what,” Pixie intoned, not tearing her gaze from the plaque, “I think I’ll pass.”

“Suit yourself,” Peter said, gave her another fake (but was it really fake?) smile and entered the cemetery.  Once inside, he shrugged, as if trying to forget the outside world, and went about his business.  First things first, he wanted to check something.  He found that he still remembered the way, and with only a few wrong turns he managed to find the right path.

And there it was, same grey stone as he remembered.  So the reality didn’t change in that aspect.  “But it was her, wasn’t it?” he thought.

The inscription on the stone read ‘Mary Elizabeth McCoy, August 12 1991 - November 11 2001’ and a little below ‘Nothing lasts forever, even cold November rain’.  Peter remembered she really liked the song; it was one of her favorites.  He suddenly felt, that he missed her very much.

“It’s so strange, that you died that particular month,” Peter whispered.

“Poetic, I would say,” he heard her voice behind, after a tiny gust of wind, “Why did you call me?”

He turned around, and there she was, still as a picture, her golden blond hair unmoving in the wind.

“I… I didn’t,” he stammered.

“Then your heart did,” she came closer, and reached with her hand to his chin, “You really miss me?”

“Yes,” Peter replied shortly, and added, staring at her outstretched hand, “I’m not sure this is a good idea…”

“Don’t worry, I’ve been practicing,” she whispered, reached a little further with her hand and… touched his face.  This time it felt almost natural; he closed his eyes while she gently touched his chin, then lips and cheek.  It tickled when she lightly touched his closed eyelids, but he didn’t open his eyes.  She ruffled his hair much the same way she did when they were just little kids.  Peter opened his eyes.  Her face was very close to his.

“I missed you greatly,” he said, but she put a finger to his lips, and removed it a second later, only to seal his lips with a tender kiss.  Her lips felt real enough, but the kiss was gentle and very light, as if she was… scared, and not of him, but of herself.  He hoped this moment would last, but in a few moments she disappeared.

“Sorry!” she reappeared a few feet away from him, “If I become too agitated I lose concentration… and corporeal form.”

“You had no right,” he breathed, “If this is all an illusion…”

“It is not! It really is me,” Mary assured him, her expression sorrowful.

“Then tell me, what present did I give you on your ninth birthday?” he quizzed her, still recovering from the rush of emotions.

“You spent the whole morning attaching a new cargo rack to my bicycle, so I would stop losing my purse all the time,” she recounted with a smile, “And then we rode to our secret place, and watched our houses from there.”

“Then it really is you…” Peter couldn’t believe his eyes, “And you’re not just a memory given shape by my mind, because I forgot all about taking you to our secret place that day.”

“So what are you doing here?” she looked around, “You didn’t come here just to mourn me, did you?”

Peter couldn’t believe he actually forgot the original reason for coming here.  It’s just, well, it was Mary…

“Well, you see…” he didn’t know how to break the news to her, and chose a direct approach, “I made a deal with the devil, and now I’m not entirely happy with the results…”

“You serious?” she narrowed her eyes.

“I wouldn’t lie about such things, especially not to you,” he responded, “ **Especially** not under the circumstances.”

“But why?” she queried, “Were you that unhappy with your life?”

“It’s complicated,” Peter waved a hand.

“So?” Mary urged him to continue.  It was her best quality, she didn’t waste much time, and was always there for you, always ready to help.

“Well, I came here to get the Book I used in the future to summon this demon, to look and see what I can do,” he spilled it out.

She paused, digesting the information.

“Aha, so you were unhappy in the future, did I get that right?” her train of thought wasn’t that easy to stop.

“You could say that…” Peter admitted.

“Hm.  Do you know where it is? The Book, I mean?” she inquired further.

“Yes,” Peter responded, a little unsure.

“Let’s find it, then,” she said, her jaw set in that special, determined way.

And they went.  Peter was leading the way, and Mary followed him closely.  If someone would seen them wandering through the cemetery, they would notice that something was wrong – all the sounds were made by Peter, Mary trailed after him without any sound at all and didn’t leave any visible footprints.

They arrived at a small mausoleum.

“Francis LaVey,” Mary read, “His last name sounds familiar.  The Book is supposed to be here, then?”

“He never existed, this is all just a hoax to hide the Book,” Peter explained, “I hope it’s in there alright.”

“Wait here, I’ll be right back,” Mary said, and walked right through the mausoleum wall.  She came out shortly.  “It is there, just as you said,” she confirmed.

“Now to get it, you just need to push here,” Peter came closer to the mausoleum door, and put his hand on a round symbol on it, featuring two hands touching a wall from different sides.  Nothing happened.

“What? What’s wrong?” Mary inquired, coming closer.

“It won’t open.  In the future it did!” Peter slammed his palm into the symbol a couple more times just to be sure.

“Maybe someone did something to the door between now and then,” a third voice said.  Peter spun around only to see Pixie in her human form coming closer.  She went right through Mary on her way, never even noticing her.

“Who’s that?” Mary asked, and, catching up with Pixie, waved a hand in front of her face.  Pixie never even blinked, and Mary said, “Huh, she can’t see me.”

“So nice of you to join me here, **foul demon** ,” Peter said, stressing last few words and sending a meaningful look to Mary.  Her eyes lit with understanding, and she nodded, stepping closer to Peter.

“You mortals are useless, stand back,” Pixie cracked her knuckles, and unleashed a barrage of yellow lightnings at the mausoleum doors from her fingers.  The points of impact burned for a time with a white light, and then disappeared.  There wasn’t even a scratch left.

“So you wanna play rough, huh?” Pixie smoldered with anger, “No stupid door will stop me!”

She then did a really weird thing – she released the lightning from one hand to the other, and started to rapidly spin her wrist, as if lightning was a yarn.  She kept turning her wrist, until her hand turned into a shining yellow-white ball three times the size of her fist, which she then clumsily threw at the mausoleum.

The ball reached it and exploded in a bright white light, releasing a thousand small lightnings in every direction.  Peter had to cover his eyes from the blast, and accidently made a step closer.  It only took a split second for one small lightning tendril to find a way to his belly.

“Ow!” he fell flat on his ass and rubbed at the spot, “That hurt!”

“Are you all right?” he saw Mary’s face entering his field of view.  He nodded.

The mausoleum still stood, unaffected in the least bit.

“Now wait a moment,” Pixie brought her hands akimbo, “You are supposed to be immune to my magic.”

“I don’t know why I was protected against it, and I don’t know why I’m not anymore,” Peter said, still massaging the place where the small lightning hit him.

“I have to try something,” Pixie declared and flourished her hand in his direction.  One small lightning left her index finger and hit Peter’s shoulder. 

“Hey! Stop it,” he cried, as his arm twitched madly, “It really hurts!”

Pixie stared at her fingers with confused expression.

“It didn’t work then, but it works now,” she mused to herself aloud, and reached a conclusion, “Which means you acquired this magic immunity somewhere between now and then.”

“I don’t care, you try that one more time and I-” Peter started to say.

“What?” Pixie inquired, grinning, “You know, on such contracts, demons can torture their victims, hoping that they wish ‘for it all to end’, and the only reason why I didn’t do it, was because I thought you were immune, and it wouldn’t have any effect.”

“You won’t dare!” he shouted.

“Do you know that your soul is unprotected anymore?” she said, and clicked her fingers.

Peter felt… Good.  He felt pure bliss, and then his vision collapsed, and instead of cemetery he saw the surrounding blackness with the light up above.  He knew, all he had to do was follow it, the blackness around formed a clear tunnel between him and the light and… Something didn’t allow him to move towards it.  Something dragged him, but not downwards, where he could just barely make out the burning light of another kind, but sideways, into the darkness.

He gasped from a sudden lack of air in his lungs, when he saw Mary touching his chest, as if she tried to keep something inside.  He was vastly surprised at the expression on her face – it was pure, boiling hot **rage**.  He never saw her like that.  He tried to say something, but she put her other hand to his mouth.

“How did you do it?” Pixie screamed, “Wait, is that?..” she viciously squinted at him, “I… See you!” she exclaimed triumphantly.

“Get out of here,” Mary said quietly, trembling all over.

“You won’t order me around, you, you…” Pixie stammered, fury in her eyes.

“Last warning,” Mary almost hissed now.

Pixie laughed and released another few tendrils of lightning.  They were however aimed not at Mary, but at Peter.

Mary disappeared and instantly reappeared in their way, in one single flash putting her small hand in their path.  Peter watched wide-eyed as the lightings deflected from her open palm as if from a mirror.

“Didn’t I tell you to get out of here?” Mary said to Pixie.  And this was the first time Peter saw fear in those demonic eyes.  She didn’t move however, out of spite or shock, it wasn’t clear.

Mary sighed, and said “Some people just don’t understand when you ask them nicely,” and clapped her hands forcefully in Pixie’s general direction.  A wave of white, almost imperceptible force exploded from her palms, and in a split second reached Pixie.  She was thrown back with such a violent force, that her small shape flew over and out the cemetery walls.

Peter couldn’t believe what he just saw.

“What a bitch,” Mary said, as she came closer to him, “How are you?”

“I… I don’t know,” Peter said as he struggled to get up, “What happened to me? I saw lights and then… You.”

“She tried to rip your soul out,” Mary explained, “I just put it back, that’s all.”

She bent down over him, picked him up under his shoulders, and with her help Peter stood up.

“But what did you do next?” he obviously had trouble coming to terms with what he had seen.

“I don’t know, it just felt like the right thing to do,” Mary shrugged, as much as she could while at the same time helping to support his weight.

“Mary, you had trouble keeping your shape when you kissed me,” he kept questioning her, “And now you’re helping me stand?”

“Guess I got better at it,” Mary replied, with some steel in her voice.

They staggered towards mausoleum.

“Why won’t this damn thing open!” Peter tried to kick it, but it was hard with Mary under his right arm.

“Well,” Mary said, her voice bordering on a whisper, carefully studying the symbol on the wall, “It shows another hand touching it from the inside.  Can you stand on your own?”

“I can most certainly try,” Peter said, and grabbed the mausoleum wall for support, just in case.  Mary freed herself from under his right arm, and went through the rock again.

“Now, Pete, put your hand on the symbol,” he heard her voice as if there was no wall between them.  He did as she said.

First, nothing happened.  Then he noticed the symbol changed color – it started glowing with orange light, and in the next moment, he heard a click-sound, and the front panel of the mausoleum slid down, revealing the empty space, where a coffin was supposed to be.  But it wasn’t entirely empty, at the far end one could make out the Book, just a little to the left of Mary’s torso.

“It worked, Mary, you’re a genius!” Peter effused, but then stopped, “How did I open it in the future, then?”

“Maybe I was helping you there as well, and you just couldn’t see me?” she guessed, as she came to stand beside him, “What now, are you going to crawl inside? Or I could try to fetch it.”

“Ah, a devious trap,” Peter remembered, “A man crawls in to reach it, and then the panel slides back, effectively burying him alive.  If I remember, there’s supposed to be a white cord here somewhere, with which to retrieve it.”

They carefully studied the marble surface.

“There!” he grabbed the thin white cord deceitfully hidden in the corner, and pulled the Book out.

“Now you will read it?” Mary asked. 

“I think I’d better do it at home, I don’t feel very well,” he walked unsteadily to the spot, where he dropped the bag with the umbrella, when Pixie tried to rip his soul out.

“Don’t worry about that bitch, she won’t try anything like that again,” Mary declared with confidence, “She knows I’ll be watching her every move from now on.”

“I’ve never seen you so angry,” Peter looked at her in astonishment.

“You’re not the only one,” she agreed, “It never happened before.”

“Well it’s fine, I guess, it saved my life after all,” he staggered in the direction of the cemetery exit, but after a few steps turned back to Mary, “You coming?”

“I don’t think so.  With all these strong emotions in me, people may actually be able to see me, not only you,” she bit her lip thoughtfully, “I don’t want to give your mom a heart attack or something.  Better if I stay dead for her.”

“Are you?” Peter asked, just to be sure.

“You have seen the grave, what do you think?” Mary’s face was very serious for a second, but then she smiled “There are things though, not even death can destroy.”

“See you later Mary,” Peter waved a shaky hand, “And thank you!”

She blew him a kiss, and softly vanished into thin air.  A small gust of wind ruffled his hair.

#

He managed to get to the bus stop, his body moved rather stiffly, and felt numb in random places, but at least he was grateful he could walk.  He pretended not to notice a small limping red figure following him.  As soon as the bus arrived, he got in and sat in the corner and looked out the window, while the small figure climbed into the bus at the front end.

He ignored it, when the figure got off the bus at his stop with him, and followed him.  As he made it back through the driveway to his apartments, the figure closed the distance.

“Peter…” it squeaked.

He slammed the door to the apartment building right in front of its nose.


	5. Streets Full of People, All Alone

“Talk to me!” Pixie screeched.

Peter silently ate his sandwich, while looking at the area surrounding his apartment from the balcony.  Pixie’s cries felt like music to his ears.  He knew she wanted his attention and even more so, she would love to get one of the ‘real’ sandwiches.

“You can’t ignore me forever!” she shouted.

He watched as one car in the yard left.  He wondered whose car it was.

“I’m going to do something stupid!” she bellowed.

Peter finished his sandwich and went inside.

“I’m going to follow you!” she informed him loudly, and jumped down on his balcony.

“Tsk-tsk-tsk, what do we have here?” Mary looked down upon Pixie from the balcony entrance, “Little pest tries to get inside the house?”

“Peter, I can kill Ted, Alex and Melinda! You know I can!” she shouted over Mary’s looming figure.

“And you think I will allow it?” Mary inquired sarcastically, “Or let you live afterwards?”

“Ow-w-w-w,” Pixie uttered, her eyes downcast.

She slouched, and went back to sit on a nearby roof.

“Found anything useful?” Mary inquired, closing the balcony door and coming closer to Peter, who sat cross-legged on his bed, reading the Book.

“Not much, but still something,” Peter turned the Book sideways for her and pointed, “Here, see this piece?”

“‘Demonic Kiss’ – a demonic gift to mortals, which grants their memory dimensional integrity and allows them to perceive the Unseen (e. g. spirits, angels and other demons),” she read aloud.  After a short pause she added, “This is why you can see me.”

Peter nodded thoughtfully, and brought the Book closer to himself. “I’m sorry I called you again so soon,” he said looking up from the Book, “I was really afraid she will do something, especially considering the silent treatment on my part.”

“Ah, don’t bother,” Mary shrugged, “Glad to be of use to someone, you have no idea how boring a world can be when all you can do is watch.”

“I can imagine,” Peter intoned, “You’ve been like this for what, five years now?”

“ **Almost** five,” she responded, “Seventeen hundred and fifty seven days, not including today, that’s four years, nine months and twenty-three days, considering that the only leap year so far was two thousand four.”

“You counted them all?” Peter inquired, amused.

“You’d be surprised at what you can do, if you don’t have to go to work every day, never sleep, eat or drink and never get sick,” she mused.

Peter turned the page, tried to readjust his position on the bed and made a clumsy move with a leg that’s gone stiff, hitting the Book in the process.  A folded paper, apparently hidden deeper in the Book, fell out.  Mary picked it up.

“Notes on special rites, ceremonies and contracts by F.” she read, unfolding the paper a few times “Could be interesting, it is quite big.”

“Well, if you want, grab a pen and a paper,” Peter gestured at the table, “And you can study it for anything of interest while I’ll search the Book for answers.”

“Why not,” Mary agreed, and added “But listen for the footsteps while working, I don’t want anyone to see a flying pen, or worse, a pen that writes on its own.”

#

Pixie was crying.  It wasn’t a ‘hey, look at me’ type of crying, but rather a few quiet, almost silent sobs now and then, as her tears found their way into her nose and mouth.  And she wasn’t doing it sitting on the edge of a rooftop, where Peter or that… creature could see her, but rather hid behind a vent on a roof of a nearby building.

Pixie knew it wasn’t a good idea to try those things on Peter, much less to say the things she said.  Each time she tried to use force, it only alienated him even further; and now that he found himself a protector, she was done for.  She doubted that even a higher demon could deal with a guardian spirit that strong.

Well, the situation was exploitable.  From bits and pieces she managed to overhear and conversations she eavesdropped on, Pixie knew that they were close.  Maybe you could just wait, until they grow to love each other, and he would wish with all his heart for her to live again? Oh, Pixie could grant that wish with the power of the contract and the big boss himself, but then the contract will be done, and Peter will go to Hell.

Little demon couldn’t help feeling torn apart.  On one hand, that would mean a success for her, and this whole story would be over.  But on the other hand, her vacation would be over too, and other hopes she had had, fantastic hopes and dreams – would crumble to dust and disappear, maybe for another thousand years.  And who knows, maybe she would never get a lifetime contract ever again.  Yet so far her vacation wasn’t exactly a most pleasant one, so maybe getting it all over wasn’t that bad.  But then again, it wasn’t exactly clear if she was allowed to succeed, for reasons left unmentioned.

Pixie produced a paper napkin out of her pocket and blew her nose.  If only she could understand Peter, if only she knew what to say.  She needed more and she knew it.  She needed… humanity.

#

“All I could find, were the contract types, here’s a full list,” Mary said, handing Peter her records.

“And how are we supposed to discover which one it is?” Peter addressed the question to the world in general, “Some of their names don’t even make any sense – like, what does ‘transmogrification contract’ even mean?”

“Well, instead of thinking about what we don’t know, let’s focus on things we do know,” Mary took the paper back, prepared a pen, and asked “Did she say anything, anything at all about marriage?”

“I don’t think so…” Peter shook his head.

“Then we can rule out the ‘Marriage contract’ and ‘Happily ever after together contract’,” she crossed a few lines out of her list, and continued “Then, did she say anything about making ‘the soil fertile’ or turning everything you touch into globes?”

“Wasn’t it supposed to be gold?” Peter raised an eyebrow.

“No, here it says ‘globes’, look,” she showed him the paper, and then furrowed her brows at the writing “Or maybe it meant ‘gloves’?”

#

The carpet under the big TV was covered with crumbs.  The little boy was sitting on it, and slowly eating yet another cookie.

“If you’re gonna be such a little slob, your mom might turn off the TV,” Pixie told him in a menacing voice, “And we don’t want that, do we?”

The kid shook his head vigorously.

“Oh, just look at yourself,” she scolded him.  Pixie pushed the bowl with cookies closer to him and wiped his face of bits of saliva and wet crumbs.  He chuckled when she touched his face with a paper napkin.

“Life is like a hurricane here in Duckburg…”

“Now behave yourself, it’s starting!” she reminded the boy, and they both stared at the screen.  In all the time she lived, or, to be more precise, existed – she never thought of stopping for a moment to watch a cartoon.  She didn’t need to.  Until now.

#

The door burst open.  Mary barely managed to drop the pen and paper in time, and froze still.  Peter looked up.

“Peter, the lunch is ready,” his mom announced, “You’re getting ready for tomorrow?”

“Yes, mom,” he answered more out of sense of duty.  This was the expected and easiest answer.  The sight of Mary still as a statue made him feel uneasy however.

“Right,” his mother responded.

Peter shut the Book closed, leaving it on the bed, and went to the balcony.  For one second he thought he caught a slight aroma of vanilla in the air, but it turned out to be the flowers from the apartment below, where they had some sort of celebration, and dumped all the flowers on the balcony for a time.  He was pretty surprised that there was absolutely no trace of Pixie anywhere, except for a rolled paper bag on the roof of the nearby building – from the time when he treated her to a small dinner.

“So how did the meeting go yesterday?” his mother asked as she joined him on the balcony, “When you came, you were so tired, and we thought something may have happened…”

“No, we had quite a good time,” Peter replied, and added proudly “One pretty girl even kissed me!”

Peter moved slightly to sneak a look back in the room.  Mary moved for the first time since his mother came in; for a split second she looked confused, and then smiled shyly.

“Well, I can think of more than one good reason, why a pretty girl would want to do that,” his mom said and laughed, “Just try to be careful with ladies, Peter.  Make sure you’re not hurting anyone’s feelings.”

He thought of Pixie.  He was pretty sure he had seen tears in her eyes last time she was here.  And now, that she wasn’t…

“What’s that wistful look?” she commented, “Cheer up! C’mon, I’ve made you some tea for lunch as well.”

“Just give me a moment, I’ll come shortly,” he said quietly.

“You didn’t fall in love, did you?” his mother said and gently patted him on the cheek, and concluded, still smiling “I bet you did!”

“Mom!” he tried to escape, “ **I did not fall in love!** ”

“Well, you should!” she laughed even more, “If she’s a nice girl, give her a call sometime.”

“Fine, fine,” he surrendered, “I will, I promise!”

Peter’s mother finally left, and he went back to his room.

“Can you by any chance, eat?” Peter asked, not hoping much for a positive answer.

Mary shook her head.

“I tried.  Well, I can concentrate my will on chewing, but I don’t feel anything - no smell, no taste,” she explained, “And it all sort-of… falls out.  I’m sorry, but seeing me trying to eat will be highly unappealing.”

“Well, I’ll go have my lunch then,” Peter responded.  As he put his hand on the doorknob, he turned his head to look at her, “Can I help you? Cure you or whatever?”

“I’m dead, Peter!” Mary reminded him, “You can’t cure death, can you?”

He couldn’t, of course, but that didn’t stop him from thinking about it.  If there was a way…

#

The cola and popcorn didn’t feel fake, unlike the money she paid for them.  Pixie was crying again, this time because of a sad and romantic movie she’d been watching.

It was about a man, who loses his memory, but never stops having feelings for a certain girl.  Hundred minor complications, wrong words being said and eavesdropped on, people overreacted all the time; of course, misunderstandings were the blood and bone of the genre.

Despite the fact that the story was made entirely of distilled clichés, Pixie was deeply moved, blowing her nose more than once and gathering quite a few stares.  The disguised demoness didn’t care, she could easily disappear from their minds just by clicking her fingers, but fighting over cola and popcorn didn’t go well with her plans for the evening and for now, she preferred to remain visible.

The itch was there, ever present, it was driving her crazy and when it got especially bad she gritted her teeth, but endured.  Sometimes she felt like a mother who didn’t know where her child was at the moment; other times she felt like an engineer, failing to complete the project or at least make it presentable before the deadline; neither of the feelings was pleasant, and Pixie found it extremely hard to focus on anything.  This was one of the contract conditions – so that the demon, who signed the contract, would tempt the mortal instead of slacking off, for example, watching movies.  What choice did Pixie have anyhow? Maybe if she wasn’t a demon, Peter might even like her.

She felt it again, as a wave of sickness went through her body.  This time it was like a realization you had left the stove on before going to work.  Only she had no home, no stove and no work. 

And then she remembered about the bet.  Of course! If she wins, she can wish for anything, right? Right?..

#

“I swear if I read one more line, I’m going to jump off my balcony!” Peter avowed as he shut the Book close with a loud clap.

“My eyes don’t feel a thing anymore, but somehow manage to hurt,” Mary complained as well.

Peter hadn’t been forthcoming with Mary, as he, pretending to study the Book about his contract, read everything he could about spirits, the ways demons grant wishes and generally searching for ways to resurrect someone, turn back time and cure illness.  As a result, his head gradually filled with a load of useless information, about, for example, Aztec rituals (which mostly revolved around killing their enemies, and the only thing that differed was the price paid).  He didn’t tell Mary, he was almost sure she wouldn’t approve.  That of course meant that he had to re-read everything she went through already, slowing their search to a crawl.  Peter could in fact ask Pixie, and probably would’ve done it already, but he couldn’t find her anywhere, yet he didn’t reach the stage where he would actually try to call her.  “Where did she go?” Peter wondered, standing on the balcony, “She couldn’t have gone far, if there was any truth to what she said about the ‘itch’.”

“You know, it would be way easier, if we asked your demon about it,” Mary said, as she joined him there.

“Now you’re reading my thoughts?”

“It just seems like the most logical and simple thing to do,” she said, leaning on the railing and putting her chin on her fist.

“Demons lie,” Peter said, “You think it’s a good idea?”

“A man is more likely to tell the truth if you put a gun to his head,” Mary reasoned, “I could be quite persuasive, you know.”

“You think it’s necessary?” Peter raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, don’t defend her,” Mary countered, “She was about to kill you.”

“Twice,” Peter agreed, “But being so bloodthirsty does **you** no credit.”

“Peter Talley,” Mary said, and smiled “Are you trying to save my soul?”

“Well, I think it’s worth saving,” Peter replied stoically, “Don’t you?”

“You know,” she replied, “Even with all that shuffle with demons and supernatural, I don’t believe anymore.”

“You mean God?” Peter queried.

“Anything really,” she shook her head “Death was… Nothing.  One moment you’re there, suffering, and the next moment you just stand very still in the hospital and just watch everyone.  People come and go, do things.  And you don’t care! You’re even too lazy to move.  You want nothing.  You don’t want all those people to move, and you don’t want them to stop.  And then… I went to our secret place, and found you.”

“I remember,” Peter said and shivered a little, “Your cousin just told me about… You.  I went back, thinking that maybe the place would make me feel happy.  But it’s never the places, it’s always other people.  Without your laughter it just wasn’t the same anymore.  Too quiet, and silence just hung there as a constant reminder of what had been.  I couldn’t stand it, and left.  Never came back.”

“I know, I was there,” Mary’s hand found his, “I tried shouting, I tried everything.  And all I managed to do was making the wind ruffle you hair.”

“But now you’re here,” Peter’s voice slowly became a whisper, “You don’t even have trouble touching things anymore.”

“I noticed that too.  It looks like what happened at the cemetery changed something,” she confessed, “I didn’t know I could do those… Things I did.”

“I wonder…” Peter started, “Eh, never mind.”

“If it is okay for us to be together?” Mary looked him in the eyes, “Is that what you wanted to say?”

Peter just looked at her silently.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Is that it?”

“What?” she looked at him quizzically.

“I thought you’re gonna say something else, not just ‘I don’t know’” Peter said raising his voice slightly.

“Well,” she said and looked down, summarizing “I got all the time in the world, nowhere to hurry now.  From philosophical point of view I can do whatever I want.  I’ve seen death; I know what it’s like.  I’ve never seen an angel, let alone God,” she took a pause.  “From practical point of view, I have trouble sensing things.  Sure I can touch things, I feel the pressure on my form, but it’s like… Like I have no skin to tell me whether it feels good or not,” she made a pause, took a ragged breath and continued, “However I feel things with my soul, my mind, heart whatever.  These feelings are probably even stronger than they were in life; no more distractions, I guess.”

“Yeah, I get why you chose to say ‘I don’t know’ at first,” Peter said, pursing his lips.

“If you are from the future,” she said, giving him a sly look, “I just don’t understand one thing.”

“Shoot.”

“Just how many girlfriends you had over what, ten years?” she inquired, and couldn’t help but smile.

“Nine years, five months and fifteen days,” Peter corrected her.

“You counted them?” she queried.

“Nah, I just made it up to look smart,” Peter admitted.

“I was serious you know,” she said.

Peter thought for a second.

“Not as many as I would like,” he admitted.

“That explains it,” she dropped quickly and turned away.

“What?” he touched both her shoulders lightly, and said “Tell me.”

“How you missed all the subtle signs,” she whispered.

“Wha-” he didn’t finish the sentence, because she swiftly turned back to face him and locked his lips with a kiss.

#

Monday came inevitably, as only Monday can.  No matter how you try to hold on to the weekend the Monday just creeps up on you, exactly when you feel safe, cuddled and thinking that this sweet blissful sleep will last forever, it lunges and wakes you up with the sound of your alarm clock.

As much as Peter hated Mondays just like everyone else, he couldn’t stop himself from grinning like an idiot all the time.

“You think he finally lost it, Sam?” his dad asked.

“Oh, don’t be like that,” his mom replied, “The boy is just happy that his dream is coming true is all.”

She wondered herself what made her son so happy as well, but she just didn’t say a thing about it. It is amazing how little people know about each other, especially close ones – like parents and their children.  Take a simplest of situations – a man quits his job, and at the same time drops a few lines to the girl he liked long ago.  And then, if she responds kindly to him, he is happy – and everybody around the man start thinking that the job must have been terrible, that’s why he’s so happy after quitting it.  And if she turns him down, he becomes sad – and everybody thinks, that leaving his workplace was hard for him or that he was in some kind of trouble.  The thing is, that people assume they know everything about a person, but there’s sometimes more to it than that.  And when people assume something, it is almost like they have decided it for the person itself, so instead of trying to ask the right kind of question to discover the truth (or at least some part of it), they settle for a more comfortable and easily reachable lie, creating misunderstandings everywhere they go.

Peter’s parents weren’t special in that regard – they didn’t care enough to try to and question him on the topic, and he wouldn’t have told them anyways.  It would take quite a devious mind and a couple tricky questions (or a few very straightforward ones) to get at least some truth out of him – but there he was, the mystery of his good mood left undiscovered forever.

Still smiling, he went to school.  Despite the rainy weather, he decided not to take the bus again, and went on foot, skipping around and over puddles, a couple bad steps leaving his feet somewhat wet, but not so as to be soaked; he didn’t mind, his thoughts were elsewhere, as his mood from ‘joyful’ slowly started the inevitable slide to ‘worried’.

But he was distracted from that by someone tapping him on the shoulder, shortly after he felt something colliding with his umbrella from behind.  He turned around and immediately regretted it, as the strong perfume aroma assaulted his senses, filling his eyes with tears.

“Hey there, I wondered if it was you,” Melinda chirped happily, “Peter, right?”

“Why do-” he stopped to try to smuggle some fresh air into his lungs and finished “...  You use so much of the stuff?..”

“What do you mean?” she rounded her eyes at him.

“Your perfume,” he clarified.

“Ow, you don’t like it?” she looked crestfallen.

“I can’t say I do, it’s just – don’t you think it’s a little too much?” Peter tried.

She was wearing the same outfit as when he first met her, except now instead of stack of papers she held a mottled dark blue umbrella, with spots the color of baby pink on it.

“I dunno, I like the smell,” she shrugged, “You’re going to school?”

“As a matter of fact, I do,” Peter replied, thinking if it would be appropriate to keep a distance from her; to his vast displeasure she fell in step beside him on his way.

“Listen, about Friday,” she said, and looked at her feet, “I’m really sorry it happened like this.  I hoped you’d end up in science class just like I did…”

“That’s strange,” Peter thought, “I don’t remember her in the future.  Maybe I really messed things up with my presence? Or she’s really just Pixie in disguise.  Well, let’s put that to the test then.”

“Oh, drop it, I know it’s you, Pixie!” Peter exclaimed.

“Um, what?” Melinda stopped and took a step backwards, “Maybe it’s not the best time…”

“Sorry, I thought my friend is playing pranks on me again, and you’re part of it,” Peter instantly came up with a convincing lie.

“Oh, happened to me too,” Melinda replied, relaxing a little, “Somebody was constantly hiding my shoes in the middle school – and I kept finding them later in most unusual places.  Funny thing, when I once forgot them at home, I thought they did it again.”

“Yeah, sorry,” he clutched at the offered straw in a manner similar to a drowning man, “I must admit I’m a little paranoid because of it.”

Peter removed his umbrella for a second just to check, if the rain was still there.  He felt awkward, but risked making a small gesture towards the school.

“Who’s Pixie?” Melinda inquired curiously, as they started walking again.

“Just my personal, hm,” Peter paused, searching for the word, “Eh, **demon**.”

A small red car passed by them.  The color reminded him of the color of Pixie’s skin, tires and certain details made out of black plastic only made resemblance stronger.

“Sounds like she has a thing for you,” Melinda laughed lightly, rushing ahead a little to dance around especially large puddle.

“Oh you wouldn’t be saying that if you knew everything,” Peter said in a dull voice.

“Well, if she’s playing pranks on you, maybe it’s just her way of communication; besides, if you call her a **demon** , I think it means she dedicates a lot of her time to pester you, which again proves,” Melinda turned around to look at Peter while walking backwards, and concluded, raising her index finger and smiling at him “She has a thing for you.”

“Well, she kinda **has** to see me a lot,” Peter clarified, “She made a certain… Commitment.  Hey, careful!”

“Well, would you make a commitment, which would tie you to someone you don’t like?” Melinda was merciless and unstoppable with her reasoning, as she turned away from him just in time to avoid a small metal trash can and a postbox she was inevitably approaching with her back.

“Well,” Peter scratched his head, “No, unless there was another reason.”

“Was there?” Melinda stopped to let him catch up, turned sideways, shook her head and smiling, said “I don’t think so.”

“Was there, really?” thought Peter, “Pixie said she wanted a vacation, but what kind of a vacation she had so far? Shadowing me all the time? Sitting on the roof? But she was really happy when she found out I was helpless.  Or was she? Vicious – yea, but happy? Can demons even be happy?”

They reached the school in the meantime, and observed a parade of umbrellas to the school gate.

“Listen, are you busy today after school?” Melinda asked suddenly.  Peter couldn’t believe his ears.

“Uhm, as a matter of fact, I am” he answered, confused.

“I just thought,” she blushed, and turned away from him, “Maybe you’d like to go out sometime.  With me, I mean.”

“Sorry,” he replied sheepishly, “But I’m already seeing someone.”

“Never mind then,” Melinda said with a fake smile, and went on her way, “See you later!”

Peter’s expression from a slightly confused one changed into thoughtful, and he went about his business.

#

“Now, it seems only Maximilian Lewis is absent today.  Anybody knows where he is? No? No one? Hm, okay…”

Mr. Caldwell finished the student roll call, and proceeded with the lecture.  Peter sat at his usual spot and Pixie was in the classroom as well; he tried talking to her before the class started, but she rapidly increased the distance between the two of them even before he was able to produce any sound at all.

“What do we know about art? Any examples?” Mr. Caldwell was that kind of person, who tried to ‘get’ to the audience, to shake it, but at the moment, and Peter could vouch for it – half the people in the classroom just wanted to be left alone.

Nobody ever got a chance to answer him – as from the corridor they heard something weird, which turned out to be music.  The sound quality wasn’t the best of course, it sounded pretty weak, but the song itself was unmistakable – it was Wagner’s ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ approaching its most epic moment.

The classroom doors opened and something began slowly rolling inside.  A few seconds later, it was revealed to be a young man, standing on some sort of platform in the classic ‘superman’ pose.  He had a round face with quite big nose, which however didn’t look out of place at all; his shaggy dark brown hair was swept to the side.  The outfit he wore consisted of the casual school uniform, but with added huge sweatpants, their legs tied in a knot under his chin in a manner one would wear a cloak, the knot being the place where he also stuck a red rose, its stem carefully cleaned of most of the thorns so that he wouldn’t hurt himself by accident.

The class went very quiet; there were gaping mouths and wide eyes everywhere.  The platform, which turned out to be a cart, was apparently borrowed from school’s dining hall (which was evident by a stack of plastic trays still there, on the bottom shelf) slowly proceeded behind the back row of desks and towards the open window, all the while music was playing from a phone, held suspended on a clever strap on his chest.  The young man, standing on the cart never moved, however his expression changed to that of pure bliss.

Peter never knew, who started laughing first, but the classroom exploded – with laughter, various cries and applause.  Peter found himself clapping just like everybody else, and even then didn’t stop – whoever had the guts to pull such a show on their first day definitely deserved it.

The young man on the cart turned his head sideways and awarded the cheering audience with a gracious smile, bowed, and jumped out the window.  The audience went quiet again; it was, after all, **fifth** floor.  It didn’t take them long to assemble near the window, worried about the fate of their ‘superman’.

They saw nothing.  A few people walking under their umbrellas in the courtyard behaved as if a person hadn’t fallen out of the window just moments ago, and there was nothing on the pavement right under it.

“Does anybody know if this was planned?” Mr. Caldwell sounded worried, “Should we call an ambulance maybe?”

A short cough from the back drew their attention.  The only desk in the class, that was vacant after the roll call, was occupied by a young man.  His phone no longer played any music, and the rose was gone, but he apparently forgot to remove his makeshift cloak.  He was looking at the blackboard, faking interest; his clothes however were wet in random places, giving away his recent venture outside.

It took a few moments until everybody realized, what had just happened, and shortly, the young man, Maximilian, was surrounded by their attention.  People introduced themselves, patted him on the shoulders and on the back.

As everyone calmed down, the teacher proceeded with his lecture, giving Maximilian a polite smile.

“As Mr. Lewis demonstrated to all of us right now, art is everywhere – even when making a flashy entrance like this one.  It forms the desirable first impressions, and may make things smoother later.  Oh, by the way,” Mr. Caldwell took a pause, and just a tiny bit reproachfully added “I trust you will take the pushcart and the sweatpants back to their rightful owners? Unless the clothing item in question belongs to you, of course.”

Maximilian nodded, stood up, and rolled the pushcart out of the classroom.  Peter thought that Mr. Caldwell wanted him to do it **after** the lecture, but it seemed the boy took everything literally, and the teacher had way too steady a mind to try and stop him.  Besides, Peter saw him laughing and cheering along with everybody when Maximilian first appeared.  “Hm, my teacher in the middle school would never allow anything like it,” Peter thought lazily, as Mr. Caldwell continued talking about the importance of art.

Maximilian returned to the class about two minutes before the lecture’s end, eating what appeared to be an éclair, obviously acquired somewhere along the way.  When the lecture was over, Peter saw with a corner of his eye, as Mr. Caldwell made his way to their ‘superman’, and spoke quietly to him, the expression of painful acceptance sliding on the student’s face, as he began nodding to whatever the teacher was saying to him.  “There goes another point for Mr. Caldwell,” thought Peter, “Not scolding Maximilian publically, but in quiet, almost private conversation.  This way he won’t antagonize anyone, first of all himself.  Clever!” Peter gathered his stuff and sauntered out of the classroom, heading for the biology class with everybody else.

The rest of the day at school Peter felt a little sleepy, but sometimes he found he was actually interested in the classes.  The myth about homework in arts class proved to be true, the load was somewhat reduced compared to science class and Peter was grateful for that.  He didn’t have a chance to speak with Pixie, who seemed to have made it her priority to avoid him.

At lunch break the rain had finally stopped, and Peter decided to eat outside.  Sitting anywhere wasn’t a good idea, so instead he chose to stand under the concrete canopy over the school doors to the inner yard, watching the surroundings.  The sun was constantly appearing through the holes in the clouds, only to disappear a few seconds later.  It seemed that a certain party took place in school yard on the weekend, where a small stage was left with a piano, confetti and serpentine streamers lying everywhere; it was a kind of a talent show, as was evident by the huge orange cardboard letters hanging over the stage, which at the moment desperately questioned the world in general ‘….LENT ..HOW’.  Peter thought he recognized some of their fallen brethren in the dirt at the foot of the stage, but he was too lazy to come and look for himself, besides, all the wet dirt couldn’t be good for his shoes.

“Hey,” he heard someone behind him, after the door slammed, “Well, aren’t you a lucky one.”

Peter turned around to see a familiar face of Maximilian Lewis.

“Peter Talley, we’re in same class,” he extended a hand for a handshake, “And what makes me so lucky?”

“To hear me greeting someone,” he replied, shaking Peter’s hand, “That’s a rare occurrence.  I mean, why should I greet someone like, every freakin’ day? That’s weird.”

“I think the last sentence was mine to say,” Peter said, furrowing his brows.  Something about the way Max communicated left him uneasy; each sentence left him feeling confused about what kind of reply was expected of him.

“Whatcha got there?” Max inquired, and Peter noticed he had a bag in his hands as well.

“Sandwiches - cheese and sausage,” he replied, and queried in turn, “What have you got, then?”

At this time in his previous youth, Peter mostly preferred junk food, but he found he was nostalgic for these homemade sandwiches, besides, they were a much healthier food.  And they just didn’t make them same in the future – the company which sold this cheese he liked so much went bankrupt around 2013, and they had to try hard to replace it.  Sure, the new cheese was alright, but it just didn’t taste the same and that was important.  Because if you can’t even hold on to cheese, what else can you hold on to in this life?

“Fish sticks,” Max said, and waved a bag in front of Peter’s nose; it was almost empty.

“Fried?” Peter asked, a little put off by the unusual nature of Max’s snack.

“Frozen, last time I checked,” Max inspected the package, just to make sure.

Peter gave him a blank stare.  Maximilian beamed at him.

“What?” he asked, smiling.

“I thought you came here to eat,” Peter turned away from him to look at the yard again, starting another sandwich.

“Ah, no, fish sticks! I stuffed those trousers I used as a cloak full of these, a small present for a third-year student for his service,” he chuckled quietly, “Besides, I ate already, when I took back the pushcart.”

“So what are you doing here?” Peter leisurely inquired.

“Hiding, what does it look like?” Max replied, “With that little trick back there I created quite a furor around myself, and now everybody tries to be my friend.”

“What’s so bad about friends?” Peter continued to ask, just to keep conversation alive.

“Because they are not,” Max sighed, “They are… Wait, where are candlesticks? Oh-h-h-h…”

 “What candlesticks?” Peter asked, and turned around to see that no one was there anymore, only a rose flower was lying on the ground.  It was apparently the same one he had used earlier in the morning.  “Another nutcase around, as if Pixie wasn’t enough,” he thought, and picked up the flower.  “Yet he’s alone, just like we all are,” Peter looked around the yard, “With streets full of people.”


	6. Above Us Only Sky

Later that day, Peter left his apartment building with a small cardboard box in his hands, wearing a leather jacket, his favorite maroon-colored plain t-shirt and denim jeans, smelling heavily of cologne.  He remembered how terrible it was with Melinda, and so he tried not to overdo it, still keeping the smell strong enough.

The darkness slowly descended upon the world, filling the city air with magic – that kind of magic, when it’s not dark yet, but all the billboards and storefronts are already lit up, and those lights they place at the foot of the buildings making them look taller and prettier at night.

Peter paced through one of those parts of the city, where little buildings were shadowed by huge trade and entertainment centers, and tried their hardest not to look inferior by being brighter and more colorful.  Here was everything you could wish for – small electronics shops, where the proprietor will always have the type of cable or adapter you are looking for; butcher stores, where other store owners always bought that special steak or ribs, a little cheaper and much tastier than the one from mall; flower shops with that understanding salesman or saleswoman, who knew exactly what kind of flowers your girl might like; gift parlors, where you could buy all manners of things, even fridge magnets with wonders of the world – no need to go all the way to Paris to get one with Eiffel Tower; small bakeries, which also had two or three tables with chairs, so you could enjoy a soft, freshly baked pastry with a cup of tea, coffee or cocoa and sharing the moment with the person of your choice; and plenty more.

He grabbed the box, which he had been carrying stuffed under his arm so far, in his hands.  “It’s time,” he thought, and concentrated on his memories of Mary, and soon felt the characteristic rush of wind.

“Hey, I thought I still had some time to prepare,” she complained, appearing behind him, “You called me a lot earlier than I planned!”

“What have you been doing?” Peter asked, curious.

“It’s a secret!” she blushed, and tried to avoid his stare, “I will show you later…”

“Fine,” Peter barely managed to contain a laugh.

“Maybe it is not such a good idea after all…” she said, as she looked down and shuffled her feet nervously.

“Hey, relax,” Peter put a hand on her shoulder, “That’s what we are here for, right?”

“I know,” Mary looked up at him, and laughed stoically, “Look at me, I’m dead but still afraid of… Everything,” she took a ragged breath, and then as if reaching a decision, raised her head, sticking her chin up proudly, and proclaimed, “We’re going to have a good time!”

“You think you can do it?” Peter inquired.

“I am sure I can keep the shape if I become visible, but I need some strong emotion for it first,” she said.

“Well, I think there’s only one emotion fitting for the evening like this,” Peter concluded.  He leaned forward, and whispered something in her ear.  She immediately blushed, then shut her eyes, and next moment, she gasped and put a hand to her mouth.

“Love confessions are all well and nice, but could you two do it someplace else, and not in the middle of the narrow passage? **Thank you!** ” the venomous remark came from a passer-by, who had to lightly shove them both aside to walk down the alley.

“It worked,” Mary whispered, “I don’t believe it…” She looked up and discovered Peter’s hand palm up, not far from her face.

“Shall we go, dear lady?” he said graciously and smiled.

Mary, at first shy, finally let go of her worries and beamed, taking the offered hand.

“What’s it gonna be then?” she queried, looking around at shops and stores.

“Anything you want,” he replied, and, thinking for a moment, added “You can’t change your clothes, can you?”

She looked at herself.  He was right of course, her usual attire, consisting of blue sweater, short red skirt and brown shoes didn’t exactly fit, but would do of course.  Of all the things, her shoes looked the most out-of-place; she wished she could change them for sneakers at least.

“I don’t think so,” she shook her head, “I have no idea how to do it.”

“Then, I think this will do for the evening,” Peter took the small box in his hands again, and opened it.  Inside was a plain black plastic hair band, with a rose flower pinned to its side.  He took it out, and gently adorned Mary’s head with it, fixing it just so the flower would not slide to the side over time.

“I look stupid,” she said clumsily, avoiding his gaze.

“Don’t be an idiot, you look absolutely adorable,” Peter reassured her, “This flower has history, you know…”

They strolled ahead, and Peter told her about his day in the school; she laughed hard when he told her about Maximilian and his show.

“…And if I’m not mistaken, this is the very same flower,” he finished.

“Oh, by the way, did you get them?” she inquired, as they slowly proceeded to a wider part of the street.

“Of course, had to stand in queue for half-hour, but I did,” Peter answered, rummaged inside his pocket a little and produced two small colorful papers, and read from one of them “The movie plays with the idea of space exploration, time and gravity as the astronauts discover a derelict alien space station…”

“Which row did you get?” Mary now hung on his arm, trying to get a look at the tickets herself.

“Not too close to the front, but not too far away as well, around middle I guess,” Peter said.

“Perfect,” Mary purred.  “I never thought we’d…” she let the sentence trail off and abruptly looked away, embarrassed.

“Go to the movies together?” Peter gently grabbed her by the chin, and turned her face to his, her eyes full of tears, “It okay, you hear me?”

She nodded obediently, and wiped her eyes.  Peter couldn’t help but notice how a few teardrops vanished upon reaching the ground without a trace.  Some things you just couldn’t change.

“Wait, what’s that… smell?” she asked, as she stopped suddenly.

“Wha-?” Peter started, and thought “But she can’t feel any smells…”

“There,” she pointed at one of the storefronts.  The sign above it read ‘Incense and spices’.

“Let’s investigate, then,” he led her into the store.

It was a small shop, with white wooden shelves crammed full of tiny bags with powders, grainy and even lumpy substances of all colors, as well as a number of dried herbs and oils in various bottles.  Even approaching the shop, Peter felt the overpowering smells, particularly the ones of lavender and one other, vaguely reminiscent of that special smell of a Christmas tree, somehow with lemon-like residue.

“Evening,” Peter bowed his head lightly to the shopkeeper, and turned to Mary, “So what was it?”

Mary pointed to a small tin incense burner, where there was what appeared to be a plain rock, lying on top of which was a small, orange-brown piece of resin, slowly releasing a strand of thick smoke, which vanished in the air.

The shopkeeper, who was a good-looking woman of unclear age, wearing bright orange blouse-like sweatshirt, smiled at them.

“I just lit this little bit of frankincense,” she said, nodding at the jar, “Could you smell it from the outside?”

“All I could smell from the outside was lavender,” Peter admitted.

“Hm-m, I too thought it smells way too strong…” the shopkeeper mused to herself, while Peter leaned closer to Mary.

“You want me to buy it?” he whispered.  She squeezed his hand in hers a little, and then nodded her expression unreadable.

“I think we will take it,” Peter said louder.

“What? That little piece?” the shopkeeper raised her eyebrows.

Before Peter could reply, Mary, with her lips pressed, lifted the incense burner, and reached for the stone.

“Careful, it’s very hot!” the shopkeeper tried to stop her, but Mary, with grim determination grabbed the stone, without any visible effort grasping the scolding hot surface, removed a burning piece of frankincense from the top of it, her expression still a stone mask, bereft of any emotion, and put the stone back into the jar.  She then took the small piece of the resin closer to her nose and breathed in deeply.

“Well, if she wants it, let her have it,” Peter tried to reason.  He paid the shopkeeper probably ten times what the little piece was worth, and they abruptly left, before any questions were asked.

“You could’ve at least tried to conceal your nature, you know,” Peter lightly scolded her outside, the vision of shopkeeper probing the stone with her finger and abruptly withdrawing it in surprise and blowing on reddened skin still vivid in his memory.

“Thank you,” she whispered, still holding the little piece close to her nose.

“I could get you whole jar full of the stuff,” he offered, but she shook her head, her lips pouted slightly, giving her a look of a stubborn child.

“You have no idea, what it means,” she explained after a pause, “To smell something… Again.”

“Keep it then,” he said, and smiled, “I think we should get to the cinema, we don’t want to be late.”

The evening was magnificent, the puddles from the morning rain were almost gone, and the generally warm weather vastly benefitted from a pleasant and refreshing cold breeze.  The cinema, unlike how it is usually pictured in classic media, was not a separate building, but was in fact a part of the giant mall in one of those buildings mentioned as shadowing the lesser ones.

Peter didn’t feel like eating anything, so he simply bought a small bottle of cola; Mary, of course had nothing, still clutching her piece of incense close, constantly smelling it, as if to remind herself, what sense of smell felt like.  To Peter, the frankincense stopped smelling about ten minutes after it was purchased (and consequently, no longer burned), but Mary claimed it still smelled strong to her.

They took their seats, and still holding hands, prepared to watch the movie.  Unbeknownst to them however, Pixie was sitting in the back row all the time.  She was a cinema frequenter now and immediately felt Peter’s presence nearby, even though Mary usually blinded her demonic senses.  It was, of course, the absence of her ‘itch’ she felt, waves of sickness were gone – and it didn’t take her long to spot them with her own eyes. Hardly believing it, she lifted the sunglasses from her eyes – those little horns of hers providing a nice hook to hold them in place. Yes, it was them alright.

“Interesting,” she said with a curious expression.

#

“They shouldn’t have forced the happy ending, it didn’t make any sense; bad or bittersweet ending would seem more natural,” Mary said, as they were walking down the street.

“People don’t like bad endings, do you?” Peter asked.

“If you want things to end up good, or at least not bad, you should push the story this way from the very beginning,” Mary opined, “Not to let things fall apart all the time, and then rush for good ending in last few minutes.”

“Maybe…” Peter let his mind wander off.

They walked in silence for awhile, and then Peter suddenly stopped.

“Where exactly are we going?” he inquired.

Mary stopped one step ahead of him, never releasing his hand.

“I want to show you something,” she said in a strange voice.

“What is it?” he asked again.

“Come on, you won’t regret it,” she said, evading the direct answer, “I promise!”

 “Okay, but this road leads to…” he started, but she didn’t listen, and almost doubled ahead, dragging him behind.  Peter increased pace as well.

And there it was, looking quite different in darkness than in daylight.

“So what are we doing at my school at night?”

“Follow me,” she said, and led him to the back gate.  All the time he remembered seeing them, they were closed; but tonight they stood ajar.

“Isn’t there supposed to be a night guard here?” Peter inquired, and Mary simpered.

“His kid suddenly had stomach pains, and demanded his dad,” she almost hummed, “At least that was the deal.”

“So he’s faking it?” Peter queried, looking at Mary with amused expression.

“Well, he’d better be, because otherwise he will never get the huge package of sweets I promised him,” Mary chuckled.

“You definitely got too much time on your hands,” he said with a smirk, and followed her to the inner yard of the school.

“So what are we doing her-” Peter started to question again, but realized that Mary had just disappeared.

“Over here!” she waved a hand from the stage nearby, the one left from the talent show.  She pushed a chair closer to the piano, sat down, and tried pressing a couple keys.

“Yeah, it’s alright, I guess the stage roof saved it from the worst of the morning rain,” Mary concluded, and added “Still, leaving musical instruments outside in such weather is definitely not the smartest thing to do…”

“Wait, I remember…” Peter reminisced, “You were taking Mrs. Nelson’s classes every Monday and Friday, right?”

She smiled brightly, “It only took a little to remember what it was like, and today I was trying to learn something new.  Let’s see…” she said, cracked her knuckles, and started to play.

Peter didn’t know the tune she was playing.  It was calm and slightly wistful, sometimes rising on hopeful note only to plunge downward to its basic melody again.  A couple times she stopped, but each time in a few moments the music started again, repeating parts of it, but a little differently each time.  He felt awkward standing there and watching her, so he quietly found another chair for himself.

“So what do you think?” she asked, after stopping for the last time.

“It’s beautiful, but I can’t say I recognize the tune,” he responded bluntly.

“Well, that’s the whole point,” she gave him an apologetic smile, “I said I wanted to learn something new, and that’s that.”

“You know… Do you ever think of what,” Peter decided to finally speak to her on the topic that was eating him from the inside all this time, “Might have been?”

“Don’t you think that asking such questions of a ghost is a little,” she replied quietly, “Rude?”

“You tell me,” Peter gave her his most honest and open facial expression.

“It is,” she replied, still speaking quietly, “It is like asking a person with missing leg, if he ever wonders what it feels like, or what his life would be like if he still had it.” She waved a hand to stop him from talking and continued, “Of course I do.  Every moment, every second I am constantly reminded of what I am.  Funny thing, the only time I was able to forget that I’m dead, was today, with you, seeing movies as if I were alive, smelling things…” she produced the piece of frankincense and smelled it, as if it was a flower.  She placed it on top of the piano as close to her face as she could, and said, “I constantly imagine what it would be like, to live like a normal person… Imagine…”

She started to play the familiar tune.  “Imagine there’s no heaven, it’s easy if you try…” she wasn’t the best at singing songs, but to Peter it sounded divine.  He saw tears running down her face, only to disappear as soon as they fell through the air; Peter felt his throat tighten, the lump feeling very uncomfortable.

“It fits, doesn’t it?” she asked in a ringing voice, shortly after finishing the song, “There is no heaven, not for me.”

“But there’s Hell, we know that for a fact,” Peter reminded her.

“Then why?” she looked at him, her chin trembling, “Why did they leave me here?”

Peter got up and walked a couple paces to look at the dark landscape, with gloomy school building menacingly towering over it on the right.

“I wasn’t forthcoming with you,” Peter confessed.

“What?” she said, in a quiet voice again.

“I wasn’t searching for the way out of the contract in the Book,” Peter explained, “I was researching ways of resurrection.”

“Are you stupid? She’s gonna take your soul!..” Mary exclaimed.

“No, she won’t,” Peter insisted, “She has taken this contract to go on vacation, and it will be over if she wins.  Besides, that time when she tore my soul out, I was ready to ascend to the Heaven, I’ve seen it.  If she does anything to me, I’m going to Heaven, she said it herself.”

“So what are you going to do?” she asked, wiping the remaining tears from her face, and getting up.

“Isn’t it obvious? I’m going to bring you back!” he declared.

After a slight pause Mary spoke again, her voice sounding strange “Is that even possible?”

“I have no idea, I could use an expert on the subject,” Peter said, “I tried to talk to her in school, but she always keeps her distance.”

For a while they just stood there, silent.

“What if…” Mary voiced a thought, “I will not want to see you anymore? If I become alive again?”

“I guess I’ll have to live with it,” he risked turning back to give her a shy smile.

“Then,” Mary shuffled her feet, and came closer to Peter, kissed him on the cheek and said “Thank you for the amazing evening! I’ll be going now.”

“Wait, why?” he questioned, bewildered.

“Well, you’ve been meaning to talk to Pixie, didn’t you? Now’s your chance,” Mary said with a smirk, and whispered to his ear “The little devil has been following us since we left cinema.”

She withdrawn from him, gave him that special smile men all over the world are dying to see on the faces of their crushes, mouthed “I’ll be seeing you!” and slowly vanished in the night, a slight gust of wind ruffling his hair, as it usually happened.  A certain object fell to the stage floor, breaking into two other objects upon reaching it.  Peter picked up the slightly wilted rose flower and a plastic hair band, along with a tiny piece of frankincense from the top of the piano, smiled at them wistfully and hid them in the small box he was still clutching under his arm.  He then approached the stage edge and brought his hands to his mouth.

“Pixie!” he shouted in the night, “I know you are here, come out!”

At first there was nothing.  Then he heard some kind of shuffling sound from the stage roof, then a short yelp, followed by a small red shape falling on the ground in front of him from somewhere above.  A whiff of vanilla reached his nostrils.

“Ow-w-w-w,” she massaged her fifth point, and abruptly stopped, noticing his stare. “Um,” she looked like a teen again, but kept her denim outfit along with the Guevara t-shirt, “Hi.  I was just enjoying the night air and happened to be around…”

“I know that you’ve been following us all the way from the movie theatre,” Peter responded.

“Oh,” she looked embarrassed.

“I wanted to talk to you, for some time now,” he started.

“I know,” she said, avoiding his gaze, “And I know why.”

“Why then?..” Peter started to ask the question, but stopped himself, because he already knew the answer.  They chased her away, and then wondered why she went away for good?

Pixie got up, and came closer to look him in the face.

“You have to understand something, if you want my help,” she intoned, “Not all demons are crazy evil bastards, same as not all humans are constantly bickering madmen.”

“I’ve been thinking a lot about it,” Peter responded, “Back then, at the cemetery, you brought my soul out, and I saw the tunnel with light at its end…”

“Yes, I took it out, was about to bring it back into your body anyways,” she said slowly, “That unexpected death would count as contract violation on my part, and same as with mortals slaughtered by demons personally, means you get to go up.  No trials, no Purgatory – straight up, no questions asked.”

“Then,” Peter took a deep breath, “I’m sorry.  For everything, silent treatment too.  Must have been terrible for you.”

“No problem, I used the opportunity to learn something new,” she tried to sound nonchalant, and waved a hand, but still blushed – a completely invisible emotion on someone with her skin color.

“So can you tell me?” he came closer to her, and sat on the edge of the stage, “How to resurrect someone?”

“Not as a zombie or anything, I assume,” she put a finger on her chin, thoughtful, “I know only one sure way, which you can use.  It will work hundred percent, but you won’t like it, won’t like it at all.  Me neither,” she added.

“Oh don’t tell…” Peter started to say, and she nodded.

“Yeah,” she confirmed, and explained, “I forgot to tell you about another important part of your contract.  You can finish our agreement anytime, by making a wish.  Your wish is instantly granted, you go to Hell, my vacation is over,” she sighed, “And neither party is happy with the result.  I doubt even **she** will be happy, knowing she lives again just because you sacrificed yourself.”

“You know, you could refer to her by name,” Peter said reproachfully, but stopped himself and added “Please?”

“Okay, Mary won’t be happy you with your sacrifice,” she corrected herself, “Besides, it will be real hard to explain to her relatives, how that is possible, that she lives again.” She thought a little, and mused quietly to herself, “Somehow, your average Joe is more likely to believe in shapeshifters and illusionist’s trickery, than magic and mysterious resurrections.”

“What should I do then?” Peter asked, allowing just a few pleading notes to enter his voice, “Is there no other way?”

“No, there isn’t-” Pixie started to say, but saw his expression, and softened up, “There… Might be.”

“Wha?” Peter raised his head to look at her.

“I shouldn’t be saying this,” she climbed on the stage, and stood behind him, “On part of me being an evil demon, filthy hellspawn and all that…” She squatted and reaching with her hands under his jacket, began massaging the area between his neck and shoulder blades.  He didn’t say anything, and she leaned forward, whispering in his ear “But I just hate seeing you like that.” She then proceeded to rub the spots of muscle tension on his back.  “There is a place,” she paused thoughtfully, picking words, but gave up and blurted “Where the likes of you can go.”

“Likes of me?” Peter queried, not sure whether to be insulted or no.

“Well, unusual creatures,” she explained, “And special mortals.  Bearers of Demonic Kiss qualify well enough.”

“And I might find help there?” Peter went straight to the point.

“You know, I really can’t tell,” she paused to think, “It’s like asking if you can get your car fixed in the New York City, without providing any details about the type of a car or how much money you have whatsoever.”

“But what should I bargain with?” he inquired, when she mentioned money.

“That may prove problematic,” Pixie stopped again, and in a moment said, “There.”

Peter felt something being pushed into his right hand.  He brought it closer to his face to examine.  It was an amulet of silver-like metal, depicting an evil, goblin-like face, with bull’s head to the left of it and ram’s head to the right.  The face had a normal human body, but one leg wasn’t human, more like to that of a rooster, but larger.  In one hand he held a walking stick.

“What is that?” he asked, turning his head sideways, but still failing to see Pixie.

“Magical signet,” Pixie explained, “What makes it valuable is that someone having it can do anything, and then blame it all on my boss, as if they were acting on his authority.”

“What?” Peter rapidly turned to her, “Why would you give me something like that?”

She looked sheepish, but then looked him in the eyes and said, “What do you think? You want Mary back or no?”

“Um, thanks I guess,” Peter said, and added “But won’t it cause a lot of trouble if it gets into wrong hands?”

“It will cause a lot of trouble if it ends up in **any** hands but mine,” she said quietly, “Make sure you don’t sell it cheap.”

“Why don’t you keep it for now, and give it to me if we need it?” he offered her the amulet back.

“I’m not coming.”

“Besides, what if someone – wait, what?” Peter’s eyes went round.

“I’m a demon! Nothing with alignment may enter the premises.  It’s how you mortals call it,” she made a face, speaking with disgust “The ‘good’ and the ‘bad’, pf…”

“And how am I supposed to find my way there without you?” Peter asked, confused.

“That’s easy,” she smiled with one corner of her mouth, “Remember that bus we used to get to the graveyard?”

“Cemetery,” he corrected her automatically, “Yeah, so?”

She sat on one of the chairs on the stage.

“Does it follow a circular route, or is it ‘there and back again’ type?” she asked.

“The latter.”

“Excellent,” she said and began explaining, “Here’s what you do – take this bus, and get out at the final stop; with any luck you will end up on some unknown street, if not – then walk in any direction until you can no longer recognize the surroundings.”

“Then?” Peter queried.

“That’s the tricky part, for everybody else; though I don’t think you will have any problems with it at all,” Pixie commented and clarified, “Start walking, your head bowed down looking at your feet, and try to get lost in your thoughts.  Try raising your head in a few minutes after walking like that, and if you see the unusually thick fog or mist, whatever, it means you’re on the right track.  From there, you will know what to do.”

“What do you mean ‘know what to do’?” he asked, thoughtful, “What am I supposed to find there?”

“How would I know?” Pixie inquired in turn, “It’s like asking a girl about the boy’s rooms.  We can see the door, and whatever that can be seen through it, but no one of us ever entered it.  It’s not like we demons didn’t want to,” she considered, “But they won’t let the likes of us in there.  You, on the other hand, are entirely different thing.  You are welcome there; I would even go as far as to speculate that they will probably be happy to see a new face.”

“Anything else?” Peter joined her on the stage, sitting near the piano.

“A number of things, yes,” she came closer, and looked at the keys.

“I’m listening,” he said.

“I recommend buying a notebook and a couple pens, and maybe a pencil just in case.  It would do you good not to rely on memory, and write down any information they give you.”

She played a simple tune on those keys she could reach.

“She… Mary won’t be able to accompany you,” Pixie said finally, “Her alignment is not pure as well, and in fact is almost the same as mine, except in different direction.”

“Got it, what else?”

She climbed on the very top of the piano.

“You got any good relatives somewhere far from here?” she asked another question, “The kind that would support a blatant lie from you?”

“No, why?” she caught him by surprise with that question.

“Time flows differently in a place where you’re going,” she cocked her head at him, “The whole trip may take anywhere from just a few seconds, to a month even.”

“Wait, I don’t plan to stay there for a month,” Peter got up, awkwardly tried to make a step back, and tripped over a chair he sat upon just a moment ago.  He didn’t yelp, but gasped, when he almost fell from the stage.

“Of course you won’t, but even visiting it for five minutes can make a week pass in this world,” Pixie clarified, and smiled at Peter.

“Why do you have this desire to climb on top of everything?” he observed, as he got up and picked the chair up as well, and sat on it again.

“Why do you constantly ask questions?” she countered.  They both simpered at each other.

“So what should I do? Can you take me back in time or something when I come back?” Peter questioned, still grinning.

“No, sorry, I can only summon the powers of the big guy himself when the contract starts or ends,” she said, but offered, “I got a better idea!”

A wave of white energy went through her body, and she changed.  Her shape gradually became more angular, and features – more masculine, until on top of the piano sat a perfect copy of Peter, but with a much more smug expression than the original ever had.

“ **Dear Lord** ,” Peter hid his face in a facepalm.

“Do you have another option?” a likeness of his voice inquired, “If so, I’ll be happy to hear it.”

“It makes me cringe, can you please turn back?” Peter said, without removing a hand from his face.

“Okay,” **it** said, and he heard her usual voice, “You can look now.”

“Thank you!” he removed his hand only to see Pixie glowing with pure happiness staring at him from the top of the piano.

“Okay, we’ll do it your way,” Peter reached a decision, and pointed a finger at her, “But a few conditions first!”

“Go ahead,” she pouted her lips a little.

“First, you need to swear you’re not going to touch the cardboard box in the furthest corner under my bed,” Peter looked at her expectedly.

“I solemnly promise blah-blah-blah,” she waved a hand and turned away from him.

“I was serious!” he insisted.

“Okay, you know what,” she jumped down and stood next to him, “Let’s make it a mini contract.  Will this put your mind at ease?”

“Actually, it would,” Peter confirmed.

“Okay,” she made a quick gesture with her fingers, “I promise not to touch, look at, or interact in any way with any boxes under Peter’s bed.”

“Done?” he asked.

“Of course, the answer is ‘no’,” she came closer to him, “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

Yeah, right, that.  Somehow in the future it all seemed easier… He stood up and quickly kissed her black lips.

“You’re not gonna win any kissing contests anytime soon,” she commented a little reproachfully.

“Oh please,” he sat on the edge of the stage again, “Don’t forget to hide the Book.  No one will come rummaging, mind you, but you never know.”

“You want me to take this box too? I know it’s important to you,” she gestured at the box Peter dropped when he tripped over the chair.

“Yes, please,” he nodded, and then remembered “Oh, and I expect you’ll take care of the homework too?”

“But it means I will have to do double homework!” she protested, “Besides, what of our bet? I can’t be you and go to school at the same time as myself.  Though I could make a very good illusion, and I will be there to keep an eye on it, so…”

“Do it then,” Peter said, and thought of Mary.  If she becomes alive again, their bet won’t matter to him.  “The bet is still on,” he added, as he jumped down on the ground, but got back to her and gave her his phone, “I guess you’ll be needin’ that.  I seriously doubt they got coverage where I’m going,” he laughed.

“Peter,” Pixie said quietly, as she took the phone in her hands.

“What?” he looked up at her.

“Do you trust me?”

He searched his mind for the answer.

“What else have I got?” he echoed her words back to her.  It felt like an eternity had passed since she said them, not just a few days.

“Then take this,” she brought her hand closer to her mouth and blew strongly onto it.  Peter saw an image of dead tree appearing under the skin on her wrist in black ink, as if it was a tattoo.

“It will give me absolute power over you, short only of allowing me to take your soul,” she explained, “But at the same time it will protect you against most magic, as long as I’m alive.”

“Um…” Peter didn’t know what to say.

“That’s why I ask again,” she brought her face closer to his, “Do you trust me?”

“I guess I do,” he replied.

“Give me your forehead then,” she squatted at the edge of the stage, holding one hand with the other, as if the one with tattoo was a dangerous weapon.

Peter came as close as he could to her, without climbing the stage again, and she pressed her wrist hard to his forehead.  He screamed and tried to pull back, as the blinding pain emanated from his skull in the point where they touched, but her hand followed his head as if glued.  It was over as quickly as it started, and Peter toppled to the ground.

“Huh,” Pixie sighed, got down from the stage, and slapped him a couple times on the cheeks, “You alright?”

“Why,” he groaned, “Why didn’t you tell me it’s gonna hurt that much?”

“O-ops,” she shrugged, “I forgot, sorry.”

“Forgot anything else?” he asked as he got up, blinking his eyes at the surroundings.  He noticed the dead tree tattoo had disappeared from her wrist, as if it never was there.

“Yes, one last thing,” she said quietly.

“What?”

She came very close, so he couldn’t help but look at her.

“Good luck!” she said, gave him a tiny kiss on the cheek, and disappeared.

Peter shook his head at the world in general.  “Women,” he thought.

#

The bus was almost empty, with the exception of a few shady characters here and there.  Peter sat in his favorite place in the corner by the window.  The world outside was pitch black as they approached the final stop.  It started raining again, drizzle combined with darkness creating an almost imperceptible wall around the bus.

The bus stopped, and everybody went to the doors. 

“It’s the final stop, kid,” driver bellowed across the bus interior.

Peter got out in the rain.  He really didn’t know where he was, and the weather did him no good.  The area around him appeared ‘barely suburban’, rural being the most accurate word to describe it.  He could see some buildings in the distance; then, of course, there was the road.

Peter quickly unzipped his jacket, hiding the recently purchased notebook away from all the water pouring down from the sky.  He wished he had taken his umbrella, but going home in the middle of the night, especially when his ‘Pixie-clone’ was there wouldn’t have been the best of the ideas.

The area looked sufficiently unknown to qualify, so he just put one hand that wasn’t clutching the notebook to his chest in the pocket, lowered his head, and focused on studying the noses of his shoes, as he went ahead from the bus stop, trotting along the sidewalk.


	7. Does Anybody Really Care About Time

He felt like an idiot.  The only thing missing was Pixie jumping from around the closest corner and informing him about it.  No matter how long he walked, nothing happened.  He would’ve been soaked by now, if rain hadn’t stopped earlier.  He paced for about half an hour already; he felt tired and sleepy, but the image of Mary never left his mind’s eye.

“Think, Peter, think!” but as if to taunt and make a fool out of him, most of the thoughts he had retreated to some deepest recess of his mind, constantly staying away from his mental grasp;  it was a side effect of him not wanting to summon Mary, by thinking too hard about her.  There was no need to do it just now, besides, that would probably ruin his plans.

“Pixie then!” he thought fiercely, “Think about her.  She wished me good luck, and gave me the magic signet.  Come to think of it, she behaved as if she… Cared? Never thought a demon could do that, but then again, maybe I let my prejudice go against better judgment and common sense? Still, I don’t know if it was a good idea to trust her.  C’mon, if the sun isn’t going to hide soon, I’ll have to remove my jacket! Wait, **sun**?”

He raised his head and looked around.  The scenery had changed.  The road was missing any markings, but was still made of asphalt, its wet black surface slightly in contrast with the emerald-colored grass on both sides of it.  The sun hung high in the sky overhead, judging by position at about ten o’clock.  And the fog! Thick, fluffy fog surrounded the road on both sides somehow blocking everything else from view, but keeping the road and the sky clearly visible.  “I made it!” he thought.

He followed the road for some time until he could see a strange speck on the horizon.  It grew as he approached, until he could make out a strange, two-story motel-like building at the crossroads.  As he approached, he noticed a few interesting details about it – for example, the gasoline prices either signified imminent oil market collapse, or were of some unknown currency, the latter more likely, as evident by the fact that every price tag had a small triangular symbol scribbled next to it.  There were no cars on the parking lot nearby, only one old-looking motorbike was parked at the entrance, near a broomstick and an empty bucket; Peter noticed more than one chrome skull on the bike.

The building had green plaster walls, the color looked faded, so it looked darker, and somehow, dirtier.  The second story was built in such a way as if the architect at the final moment decided that one story was not enough, and decided to stuff another floor even by crippling it, so as not to overload the support provided by the ground floor walls.

And of course, there was the neon sign above the main doors on the corner of the building.  Peter came closer, to take a better look.

The purple neon letters twinkled every second, and read ‘ _The CrowBar_ ’, the rest of the sign depicting a black crow, outlined with green lights, sitting at the bar; in one wing-hand it held a glass half-full (or half-empty, if you are of a pessimistic variety) of something, and in the other it held a classic red crowbar.  The neon lights flickered in such a way, that the crow was shown constantly taking a sip from the glass, menacingly swaying the crowbar all the time.

The doors were made of plain wood, painted black.  Peter found out that this whole venture didn’t really fit his expectations; he expected to find a city, or a camp, a town, a village maybe.  But not a biker bar at the crossroads! Still, there wasn’t much else to do, so he approached the door, turned the handle, opening the door softly, and staggered inside.

Before Peter could see anything, as his eyes adjusted, other senses kicked in.  The interior smelled of cigarette smoke with slight trace of wet dog; the music was abominable, but somehow fitting – the jukebox deeper in building buzzed and wheezed, but it was questionable, whether clear sound would make it any better with that infernal music.  The singer’s voice was barely audible, but it was obvious he wasn’t even trying to be heard, instead allowing the guitars to fill the gaps with a slightly ‘wild western’ riffs.  This produced a strange, somewhat monotone ambient background, generally dark spirited and maybe just a little bit depressing. 

First things Peter noticed with his eyes were a number of neon-lit vending machines at the wall to the right, a few of them constantly flickering with a ‘tsk-tsk’ sound; the metal of their carcasses looked as if it rusted for years, especially on the corners, and their contents were covered with a thick layer of dust.  Again, Peter noticed that the dollar signs were scratched away with something sharp, instead having the same weird triangular symbol hastily scribbled everywhere.  A number of untidy posters lined the walls, some of them in languages Peter couldn’t read, but others appeared to advertize some vintage movies; he felt a little reassured when he saw the very first, original poster of the Star Wars movie, the one that would be known later as the ‘Episode IV: A New Hope’.  The posters had rips in various places and most of them were of yellow hue from time.  Behind the posters and vending machines, the walls of interior looked the same as on the outside – faded and dirty, except these were of blue color, resulting in a darker and at the same time faded navy color.

Almost all of the space inside was occupied by tables and chairs, with the small exception of long bar counter at the far end, behind which the aforementioned jukebox kept filling the place with the cacophony that was the local equivalent of music.  The dark wooden tables were round, looking as if they came from the same furniture set; and apart from a few burns and scratches here and there looked to be almost new.  The chairs were their complete opposite – there were iron bar stools, which made people feel uncomfortable just by looking at them; there were cushioned chairs, and, interestingly enough, each had their draping ripped at least in one place; there were cold iron folding chairs, some looking as if the rust was the only thing that held them together; there was even a leather chair, with one chair arm missing.  As a finishing touch, the corner left of the entrance was dedicated entirely to the broken chairs, which formed an impressive mountain on top of a half-burnt pool table.

There was no one in the place, apart from a small, white-haired figure collapsed on one of the tables closer to the bar, outlined against the environment by one of the selected few (that is, still working) bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling.

Peter came closer, and announced his presence with a standard “Hello?” – but no one answered him.  The figure didn’t move.  Up close, he could see a very dirty empty glass in a small feminine hand, which would look alright if it weren’t for its long and curved black fingernails, which, come to think of it, should be called claws instead.  She wore something Peter could only describe as a cross between a goth outfit and a t-shirt; her neck was adorned with a thin but wide ribbed choker, of a cliché variety that often appears in old movies about vampires.  A slight chest movement told him she wasn’t dead.

“Ah, a new face!” a hoarse and surprisingly high-pitched masculine voice exclaimed from behind the bar, and added “Oh, don’t mind Nira, the way she’s been drinking all night, I’m surprised she’s still breathing.”

Peter raised his head to see a very casual dude, wiping the dirty glasses with a rag, which looked even dirtier than the glasses themselves.  He had dark brown, almost black eyes, hiding behind spectacles with thick black plastic frame, short hair of same color, and a face, which could even be called handsome if it weren’t for his nose, which looked like a malformed potato; his thick brows, unevenly shaven beard and mustache of same color as his hair ruined any other good impressions about his face.

He wore a plain black t-shirt and denim pants, both of which hung loose on him – he was very skinny for his impressive height, being over six feet tall.  As if to add the ridiculousness to the character, his teeth were perfectly white and even gleamed slightly whenever he spoke.

“My name is Sebastian; but please, call me Seb, everybody does,” he introduced himself, and made a theatrical gesture, “Welcome to ‘The CrowBar’!” His face went sour, when he looked at the rest of the place and he added bitterly “…Or what’s left of it.”

“Pleased to meet you, I’m, uh, Peter,” he tried to find a chair to sit on, and settled for a sturdy-looking driftwood throne close to the bar.

“I wouldn’t sit there, if I were you,” Seb pointed at him with the rag, “That’s Barry’s personal chair; considering that no other chair can hold his weight for more than thirty seconds…”

Peter hastily got up and sat on one of the uncomfortable bar stools.  As expected, the leather of the seat turned out to be very hard, to a point where it felt like he was sitting on some uneven lump of plastic, but he ignored the discomfort in favor of the curiosity.

Before he could open his mouth however. he found that Seb was standing in front of him.

“So, what have you got for me?” he said and smiled cheerfully.

“I’m sorry, what do you mean?” Peter inquired, blinking in confusion.

“Well, everybody brings me something,” he explained, “Weren’t you told to buy something before coming here? So, let’s see it.”

“I was told to write down everything I hear, so this is what I got,” Peter brought out the notebook, two pens and a pencil.

“Oh, none of us would want that!” Seb laughed, and continued, “It’s like a fight club – what goes on at the crossroads – stays here, capish?” He grabbed the notebook and examined it critically, “I could use that for records and sketches…” he mused, and offered “Tell you what, I’ll give you a thousand eternity coins for it, but throw in the pencil as well.”

“What’s these ‘eternity coins’?” Peter inquired.

“Well, you probably noticed the prices here are not in your standard currency units,” Seb explained, as he proceeded to wipe the bar counter with the rag, “Eternity coins mean a debt, a debt by the crossroads to someone who brought something here to leave it here forever.” He stopped wiping the bar, looked at Peter, smiled again and added “It’s a good deal, ask anyone.  I suggest you take it.”

“That’s not what I came here for,” Peter started but Seb raised a hand.

“You came here to find help, all newcomers do,” he said, “But it’s a custom here, to exchange advice and opinions over a few friendly drinks, and those are not free.  Unless you got a friend who’s paying for them, you could use a little bit of cash to pay for yourself.”

“Fine, we got a deal then,” Peter gave in.  “After all, it’s just a notebook and a pencil, I could buy a hundred of those,” he thought.

“Good choice,” Seb brightened, took the items in question, produced and deposited a stack of copper coins in front of Peter.

“Hardly looks like a thousand to me,” he commented.

“Ah, but they are of different values,” Seb responded as he bent under the bar counter, and Peter heard a muffled explanation, “The one’s marked with ‘L’ are worth fifty, and those with ‘C’ are worth a hundred.”

“These are Roman numerals then?” Peter queried.

“Good to know we are on the same page,” Seb appeared again, clutching a lot of different bottles to his chest, and proceeded to arrange them on the shelf behind the counter.

“Oixilo!” Peter heard a coarse, low-pitched voice from the entrance, and turned to look.  His mouth fell open – at the entrance, there stood a man made of stone! The thing stomped its way to the bar, where it sat on the very same chair Peter tried to occupy at first.  “That must be the one Seb referred to as ‘Barry’,” he thought.

“Katorz,” Seb replied in a tired voice.

Peter realized it was rude to stare, but couldn’t help sneaking a couple looks at the living mountain.  His first impression was wrong, the material looked less like stone, but more like bleached clay.  The face could hardly be called that, if it weren’t for the eyes – they looked like the only living thing on the otherwise dead and featureless visage.  They didn’t look human, or if they were, they would belong to someone who hadn’t slept in a very, very long time - orange pupils, black irises and so many blood vessels, that whites were barely visible.

Seb filled a glass with a clear liquid, a tiny wisp of smoke escaping it, and casually launched the glass to the stone man from the far side of the bar, who in turn caught it mid-slide with one precise movement of a huge hand.

“What can I get you, Peter, by the way?” Seb inqured, still at the far side of the bar.

“Maybe the same stuff this guy is having?” Peter tried.  Next thing he heard, was thunder.  But no, it was a laughter, and he felt something heavy landing on his spine at the base of his neck.  He half-turned around to see the giant smiling at him, his hand on Peter’s back.

“You wanna die, little man?” it asked, as soon as it was done laughing, and brought its face closer to his, repeating the inquiry menacingly “Do you?”

“Um, no,” Peter gasped.

“Mercy’s sake, Barry, you’re gonna give the kid a heart attack or something,” Seb picked up a small can from among the bottles and came closer, explaining, “What he wanted to say, is that you don’t want what he’s having, because that’s sulphuric acid; you’ll probably die if you drink it.”

“Uh-uh?” Peter managed.

“Well, I think you’re a little bit too young to be drinking,” Seb continued, and put a can in front of him, “So here’s a nice little can of coffee, a little aged, but will do.  Forty-nine coins.”

Peter gave him a coin with ‘L’, and received a coin with ‘I’ in change.

“So, yeah, that’s, um, Barry-” Seb awkwardly tried to introduce them, but was stopped by a bellow.

“Barthokoloss!” the man of stone exclaimed, offered Peter his huge hand for a handshake, and added in a more calm manner “That’s my proper name, you see.”

“Peter,” he said, and shook the giant’s hand, not without fear of having it squished, but the stone man was surprisingly careful about it.

“I’m a golem,” Barry confided, “And you are?”

“Eh-h-h, a man?” Peter didn’t know what was expected of him.

“Oh, their kind doesn’t get in here,” Barry replied, “There must be something special about you.  Nira is a witch by the way,” he pointed with a thumb of his hand behind his shoulder, where the white-haired figure was still lying on the table, unmoving except to breathe.

“He’s the bearer of Demonic Kiss,” Seb put in.

“How do you know that?” Peter turned to him.

“I just do,” Seb shrugged.

“Who are you then, Seb?” Peter inquired.

“What does it look like?” Seb smiled, “I’m a unicorn!”

Barry laughed hard, and patted Peter on the back.

“He’s pulling your leg, kiddo,” the golem explained, “He’s actually a pagan god, but he won’t say which one.”

“Really, a unicorn?” Peter got the joke, “You expected a question about the horn, right?”

“The joke is funnier when lady’s asking,” Seb chuckled.

Peter laughed lightly, more out of sense of duty, than anything else.  He opened the can of coffee and took a sip.  The coffee was warm, the taste bearing strong resemblance to smell of burnt hair, with sugar to make it more tolerable.

“First time here?” Barry inquired, and Peter nodded.

“I guess you came here to ask for help,” he emptied his glass in one swig, “Let’s hear it then.”

“Can you resurrect a ghost?” Peter blurted.

Barry’s features moved, to form a confused expression.  Seb raised both hands.

“Wait-wait-wait,” the god-bartender said, and pointed out, “You seem to have misinterpreted a few things.  First – we can’t… No, that’s not the word,” he paused, scratched the back of his head and continued, “We **won’t** do your dirty job for you.  You remember, I said ‘exchange advice and opinions over a few friendly drinks’ – and that’s exactly what we can and will do.”

“I got something to trade for it,” Peter brought out the magical signet amulet.

“Wow,” Barry’s voice changed, “Little man killed a higher demon.”

“I didn’t kill anyone!” Peter objected.

“No demon would willingly part with **that** ,” Seb intoned, looking carefully at Peter through his glasses, “Where did you get it then?”

Peter shifted nervously on his chair, “A… Friend gave it to me, so I had something to bargain with.”

“You don’t mean to say,” Seb crossed arms on his chest, “That a **demon** gave it to you?”

“Uhm, yes?” Peter said sheepishly.

“Now that’s a new one,” Seb turned to the shelf with bottles, picked one and opened it, taking a few generous swigs himself, “Put it away kid, better give it back to its rightful owner.  Don’t tempt us with the sight of it, it really **is** very valuable.  We will help you anyway.”

Peter obeyed, slightly relieved at Sebastian’s words.

“Now, as I was saying,” Seb continued, as if Peter never interrupted him, “We are not going to do things for you, but we can tell you how to do them yourself,” he raised a hand, “Let me finish.  That was the first point.  Second, you can’t resurrect a ghost, it’s same as saying ‘resurrect a finger’ or ‘revive a leg’.  If I got this right, you want to resurrect a person, whose soul currently appears in shape of a ghost?”

Peter nodded in agreement and took another sip of coffee, the terrible taste reminding him a little about reality.

“Can we do that?” Seb asked, directing the question at Barry.

“I don’t understand why you would want to anyways,” he opined, “Ghosts are crazy.  That’s their defining characteristic.”

“She’s not!-” Peter started to shout, but thought better of it “…crazy.”

“The demon giving the mortal his magical signet is one thing,” Seb shook his head, “Hasn’t happened before on my memory, but it is in the field of possible.  But ghost not being crazy – that is impossible.”

“She’s not a ghost then,” Barry voiced a guess.

“My colleague has a point,” Seb explained, and asked “What do you know about her? Mind it, we don’t need any personal details.”

 “Well, let’s see…” Peter recollected the events of the past few days in his mind, “At first, nobody saw her or heard her, except me…”

“You haven’t been around with Demonic Kiss for long then?” Seb queried, but then gestured Peter to continue.

“Every time she appears, there’s a rush of wind,” Peter continued.

“Can she speak? Coherently?” Barry asked, losing patience.

“Yes, she can,” Peter replied.

“We can rule out the ghost then,” Seb concluded as he put his hands together, and hid his face in them, “Ghosts are not capable of thinking, much less speaking.”

“We can speculate whole day and evening about this,” Barry told Seb, “We need a different approach, or we’re not getting anywhere.”

“What does she like?” Seb inquired, after thinking a little.

“M-m-m,” Peter remembered, “Well, she likes going to the movies and generally most things any normal person does, except she doesn’t eat.  Oh, and she really likes frankincense.”

Seb and Barry exchanged glances.

“You want to say, that in addition to magic signet and Demonic Kiss,” Seb spoke very carefully, “You also got yourself a guardian spirit?”

“I don’t know, you tell me,” Peter shrugged.

“Well, you certainly got a lot on your hands,” Barry roared, patting him on the back not as gently as before, knocking the wind out of Peter.

“So what do you think? Reanimation spell with token link?” Seb addressed Barry again, taking a few more sips of his drink.

“Too complex,” he responded, turning to face him, “There are simpler ways.”

“I’m not telling him how to perform blood sacrifices, period,” Seb raised a finger.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Barry gave him a cunning stare.

“Well, she’s a holy spirit, she can speak, and her memory is intact, so…” Seb’s eyes lit with understanding, “That’s right! Capture her essence on paper!”

“Ahem?” Peter coughed, to get their attention.

“… And then a simple summoning ritual will bring her back,” Barry finished, ignoring Peter.

“Here’s what you gotta do,” Seb turned to Peter, and stared him in the eyes, “Listen carefully!”

“First, you need a magical quill,” Barry started, “And some special ink, magical, consecrated or cursed, doesn’t matter.”

“Where am I supposed to get these?” Peter inquired.

“I used to have one quill like that around here, but it was such a pain to use, that I gave it to Felinite,” Seb explained, finishing his bottle and dropping it behind the counter into what sounded like a plastic trash can, “But you got a copy of the Book, yes?”

“Yes, but a copy?” Peter asked in confusion, “I thought there was only one.”

“What language is it in, then?” Seb crossed his arms on his chest, while Barry chuckled owlishly.

“Well, English,” Peter said, feeling very dumb.

“I understand why you could have come to such a conclusion if it was written in Hebrew or Latin; I’m not even talking about Sanskrit or Sumerian,” Seb commented reproachfully, “But modern day English?”

Barry shook his head at Peter.  “You still have much to learn,” he put in.

“So where do I get this feather?” Peter brought the topic up again.

“Oh, right,” Seb brought out the notebook he got from Peter not long ago, “You take the Book like this,” Seb grabbed the notebook by its spine, so the pages were facing downwards, “…And say ‘Solvo’, this will release the feather that was used to make that copy.”

“If nothing comes out, come back to us, we will think of something else then,” Barry assured Peter.

“And don’t forget to put the quill back in the Book, by placing it on some random page inside, then turning the Book like so,” Seb reversed the notebook position, still keeping it horizontal, but the pages were now facing upwards, “And saying ‘Sero’, this will secure it inside again.”

“Solvo-Sero, Solvo-Sero,” Peter thought; he had no illusions about his memory – it could let him down anytime, so he could as well make an effort to memorize important things.

“And the ink?” he remembered.

“Here I actually might be of help with that, wait a moment,” Seb fumbled with a keychain he produced out of his pocket, and bent behind the bar, fiddling with something metal by the sound of it.  He quickly got up and deposited a small sealed inkwell of transparent glass on the bar counter.  It was full to the brim with something black, which through glass looked to be solid, but apparently it wasn’t.

“Try not to spill it, especially on yourself, it’s cursed,” Sebastian warned.

“Where did you get it?” Barry directed the question at Sebastian, looking quite impressed.

“Remember that sword Nira dragged in here by the thread, and asked to ‘un-curse’?” Seb explained, nodding his head at the little white-haired figure behind Barry, “Well, I can’t remove curses; I can only try to shift the curse to another object or person.  And I thought – a vial of cursed ink could be useful, right?”

“I think you know a lot more, than you let us believe,” Barry said thoughtfully, and added, “I’ll have another round.”

“You sure your core can handle it?” Seb raised an eyebrow.

“It will give in sooner or later.  It’s only a question of time until I fall apart,” Barry slammed his fist on the counter, leaving a visible mark, “Might as well do it sooner, it’s not like I got a wife and kids or anything.”

Seb frowned at the crack in the polished wooden surface, but didn’t say anything and went to the other side of the bar, to fetch another drink.

“Don’t take after me, little man,” the golem said to Peter in a likeness of whisper, “Try to live a long and happy life, and don’t shorten it with poisons of body.  Of mind too, come to think of it.”

They all went silent, only to hear a soft mumble from behind, “Ph-h-h… Another drink please…” Peter turned his head to see the witch now clutching her head in her hands, as if it felt heavy.

“Maybe I should get her a blanket?” Seb sounded unsure, as he came back with another glass of clear liquid, which he placed before Barry nonchalantly.  Peter in the meantime reached for the inkwell, only to be stopped by Sebastian’s hand.

“I never told you it was free,” he said, “I’ll have those two ballpoint pens you got there.  Is that okay?”

Peter simply handed him the pens in agreement, and placed the inkwell next to his stack of eternity coins.

“So what do I do, when I get the quill?” Peter tried to steer the conversation back on the track.

“It’s simple really,” Barry responded, “You write her down.  All of her.”

“Like a… Drawing of her?” Peter asked, bewildered.

“No,” Sebastian chimed in, “What he meant was to write down her full biography.  Autobiography.  **Write down her every word precisely**.  To the letter.”

“And then what?”

“Well, once you’ve finished writing everything,” Seb continued, “If you did everything correctly, the letters will start to glow.  Then you place the whole stack in the middle of your typical pentagram, and summon her by full name, like you would a demon, candles and all, but you can skip the runes part, you won’t need their protection.  Unless of course she plans to kill you when she comes alive, in which case you should actually think about using them.”

“Good luck explaining to her relatives what happened,” Barry chuckled coarsely.

“If you want my advice about it,” Seb paced to the small sink behind the bar to wash the glasses, “Invent a story, where you save the life of some strange-looking gentleman, and he tells you to make a wish.  Tell them, you made a wish just for laughs, and when it came true you freaked out as well; tell them it’s probably a miracle.” He finished washing the glasses, and proceeded to wipe them clean, with his terrible rag “I’m not telling you it’s the best thing to say under the circumstances, just saying this is the story they most likely will believe.  Compared to the other things you may say, like, I dunno, **the truth**?”

“Seb made a good point; some people, even elderly folk, still have a little hope for miracles in their hearts,” Barry nodded in agreement, “I know my creator did.”

They sat in silence for awhile.

“Eh,” Peter sighed, “I wish I knew how much time has passed in my world.”

“Hm, I doubt anybody here really knows what time it is,” Seb smiled, “We’re all from different timelines here, so even if we wanted, none of us could tell you anything useful on that topic. Time is a precious commodity these days…”

“How can I go back then?” Peter asked.

“Oh, you’ll be thrown back where you belong, just pick any direction outside and go,” Barry said, as he contemplated the contents of his glass.

“I guess I’ll be going then,” Peter got up from his chair, his buttocks feeling numb from sitting on the hard surface for so long, “Thank you for everything.”

“You’re welcome,” Seb replied graciously, while Peter stuffed his pockets full of coins, “Just remember, it’s a custom to help newcomers at ‘The CrowBar’, and who knows, maybe one day you’ll be the one to do it.”

Peter grabbed the sealed inkwell and started towards the exit, but stopped after making just a few steps.

“Is she gonna be alright?” he turned back to face them and nodded at Nira, still clutching at her head.

“Well if it’s any comfort to you, I won’t let her to die,” Seb assured him and shrugged.

“Well, bye then!” Peter waved a hand and went out.

“So long!” Barry raised a glass and downed it, quietly adding to Seb, “I really wish we could’ve done more for the poor bugger.  He doesn’t seem to know even half of it yet.”

Sebastian, his expression serious, looked at the entrance to the bar thoughtfully for a moment, and said “He’ll be back.  Maybe even sooner than you think.”


	8. Wake Me Up When October Ends

Peter didn’t realize just how tired he was.  By his biological clock, he was supposed to be in bed many hours ago, probably even before he parted company with Mary.  So, it was pretty obvious, that at present he felt like a zombie.

As he walked by the side of the road, he suddenly noticed that he was walking on the sidewalk instead of thin gravel path, and that the road suddenly had all the right markings in all the right places.  He didn’t have much time to marvel at the discovery, as something hit him hard in the face, and he fell.  Looking up, he made a conclusion that he just walked into a ‘Stop’ sign.  That was a thing about reality – the other world, wherever the crossroads were located, didn’t have any ‘Stop’ signs, or any road signs come to think about it.

He let his head drop back on the ground, the wind feeling nice on his face.  Maybe if he would just lie here a little bit… But no, the world can’t simply leave Peter Talley alone, as was evident by two curious face-like shapes suddenly entering his field of vision.

“It is him, isn’t it?” he heard a muffled whisper.

“Of course it’s him, I can feel it you know,” the red one approached, and he winced at the familiar smell of vanilla, “Hey, Peter, can you hear me?”

What choice did he have? If he wouldn’t reply, the most likely course of action those two would take would be to shake him, or slap him on the face, and that was worse than talking.

“Sure do,” he croaked, “But I wish I didn’t.”

“Whatcha doin’?”

“Having a lie-down, what does it look like?” he replied.

“Maybe those guys have beaten him,” Mary’s voice sounded worried.

“Don’t be daft, why would they?” Pixie responded, “Unless it was some kind of stupid initiation ritual.”

Peter got up with a groan.  His whole body ached, the unlucky collision with the road sign was just the last straw that broke the camel’s back, or in this case, Peter’s spirit.

“How long have I been away?” he inquired, looking around.

“Twenty two days and eighteen hours, more or less,” Mary informed him.

“So it’s September 26th then?” Peter tried.

“27th, it’s about five hours past noon,” she corrected.

“Are you a friggin’ clock or something?” Pixie threw Mary a backwards glance, but didn’t wait for a reply and proceeded to pester Peter with questions, “So how did it go? Did you get what you came for? What were they like?”

She felt something being pushed into her hand, and widened her eyes at the object.

“They refused to help?” she breathed in disbelief.

“They thought I killed someone for that,” Peter sighed, and added reproachfully, “You never said it was **that** valuable.”

“Well,” she looked a little embarrassed, “It is.  Good to have it back, but did they help?”

“Yes, they did,” Peter started shambling in the same direction he was walking before he met with a sign, “Now can we get back home? I could use some sleep, a day or two…”

“Where are you going, then?” Pixie said, “You’re just across the street from your apartment, silly.”

And he really was! As if a veil of fog was lifted from his eyesight when she spoke those words, his apartment building appeared almost out of nowhere.

“Oh, good,” he felt dumb.

“Maybe we should keep an eye on him, just in case,” Mary said.

“Since when the two of you became friends?” he inquired, waiting for the green light at the crosswalk.

“Oh, she thought I murdered or kidnapped you to take your place,” Pixie explained, giving Mary an evil eye, “Had a hard time convincing her to wait a few months before killing me.  Oh, and by the way,” Pixie came closer and reached with her wrist to his forehead.  Before he could voice any protests, a familiar pain wrecked his body, emanating from a point where she touched him.  This time he fared much better than the last time, mostly because he was too tired to panic.  As Pixie withdrew her hand, he saw that the tattoo of a dead tree had reappeared under the skin on her wrist, and quickly disappeared again, when she blew on it.

“I trust you don’t need it anymore,” she said flatly, and added with a stingy little bit of venomous sarcasm “Considering it gave me power over you, must’ve been a torture.”

“I actually forgot about it,” Peter said, starting to walk as soon as he saw the little green man.

“Yeah, you protect them against evil magic with your life, which just happens to be in danger all the time,” she shot another look at Mary and continued, “And all you get is ‘I forgot about it’.”

“What do you want me to say?” Peter queried and yawned, walking across the yard to the apartment building door.

“You could start with a ‘Thank you’,” Mary put in, “She actually did all your homework while you were away.”

“Hey, do you mind? I can speak for myself!” Pixie turned to face her.

“Fine, I’ll come by later then,” she replied, “See to it that he gets in bed as soon as possible.” And without a second word, she vanished with a rush of wind.

Pixie escorted him all the way to his room, staying invisible for his parents.

“Listen, I know it’s probably not the best time,” Pixie said quietly as he staggered to his bed, “But I wanted to tell you something.”

Peter shot her a curious, if a little tired, look.

“What now? Another point of contract you forgot to inform me about?” he responded.

“No,” she went to the window and looked outside, uncharacteristically thoughtful.

“What’s wrong?” Peter asked, sitting down on the edge of the bed and contemplating, whether he should sleep with his socks on or off.

“Well, I had some time to think about everything that has happened, ever since we signed the contract,” Pixie explained reluctantly; he noticed that she felt very uncomfortable and maybe even a little nervous, “And I had someone to talk to.  Someone, who, if I dare say so myself, loves you with all her heart.”

“A-and?” Peter forgot about the socks, and listened with attention.

“Do you know, that you betrayed Mary, when you signed a contract with me?” she stared him squarely in the eyes.

“What?” Peter experienced a sinking feeling in his guts.

“If I ‘win’ in this contract, she, as your guardian spirit, will have no choice, but to follow us to Hell,” Pixie told him, and raised a hand, “Before you say anything, to my defense – I had no idea you had a guardian spirit; I didn’t see her in the future either.  Actually, I wonder why…”

“But I will bring her back, and even if you get to take my soul, she stays here,” he said firmly, “If anything, I can always make a wish for her to come alive, and then she won’t have to go to Hell with me.”

“And that’s why I feel jealous,” she admitted, as if confessing of a murder, and continued “You two are good friends and maybe more, while we instantly got off on the wrong foot.”

“Are you tryi-” Peter started.

“Listen!” she interrupted him and came closer to sit next to him on the bed, avoiding his gaze, “I never told you that but probably should’ve.” She took a deep breath, and said “I’m sorry.  Please forgive me for trying to consume your soul when we just met.  I think that is where everything went absolutely and terribly wrong.”

“Ehm, it’s okay I guess,” he felt awkward.  How were you supposed to respond to a ‘I’m sorry for trying to kill you’ kind of apology?

“Can we…” she looked as embarrassed as ever, “…maybe, start over? Fresh start?”

“Why not,” he replied.  She did help him after all.  Pixie turned to look at him, and he saw those amazing demonic eyes.  The kind of eyes you could watch forever and never get bored, same as they say about fire.  But there was a new look in them.  Her expression was that of careful acceptance and maybe, for the first time since their ‘vacation’ together started, she looked… **happy**.

“Thank you,” she said with a smile, getting up “Now get a good rest, I took care of today’s homework for you already.  I’ll stick around for a little bit, and then I’ll go back to the roof.”

“You know,” he reasoned, “You don’t have to sit on the roof.  You can stay in my room, just make sure no one sees you.”

“Really?” her expression from contained happiness changed to that of pure joy.

“Really,” he confirmed, and turned to face the wall, “Good night, Pixie.”

“Good night Peter,” she said and whispered, “Sleep well…”

#

“Let me get this straight,” Mary said, her expression serious, “You need to write everything about me on paper? Full autobiography, even my thoughts?”

“I’m an idiot for not thinking of this myself!” Pixie lamented, “I knew you could do that, I just forgot about it and it never crossed my mind!”

It was an early morning of next day; Peter just finished telling them about his long (or short, depending where you were at the time of it) trip to the crossroads.  He only told them the very basic information, mindful of Seb’s words about telling others what goes on there.  Pixie looked at the bottle of cursed ink with distaste, she claimed that it ‘smelled bad’ for her, but was immensely impressed with eternity coins.

“That’s the idea, but I will also need a magical quill or feather,” Peter explained, “Now where did you hide the Book?”

“Just give me a moment,” Pixie said as she rushed to the balcony.

An awkward silence descended.  After Pixie’s words yesterday, Peter felt uneasy in Mary’s company.

“I missed you,” she said.

“I know,” he replied.

“You didn’t have to go away, I’m perfectly fine as a ghost,” she tried, but Peter shook his head.

“You’re not a ghost,” he objected, “And I will bring you back, I promise.”

“Then what am I?” she asked, with awed expression.

“You are my guardian spirit,” he replied.

“I’m an… Angel?” she brought a hand to her mouth.

“Not exactly,” Pixie chimed in, appearing out of nowhere and dropping the Book on Peter’s knees, “You are a holy spirit.  When a person dies, if it had a strong attachment to someone, they might become their keepers and protectors.  They stay in our world, same as ghosts, but are much more alive – they get to keep their memory and personality, and their connection to the world of living is much stronger as well, through the person they are guarding.  You could say you’re ‘ghost of love’,” she paused to make a face and continued, “And you don’t hate me because you want to, it’s in your nature to protect the person you are attached to against supernatural threats first and foremost.”

“But what if there are no such threats? What then a guardian angel – I mean spirit, does?” Peter inquired.

“Oh, small stuff mostly,” Pixie waved a hand, “Maybe you noticed, that when you’re badly prepared for the exam, you get easy questions? Or the exam date gets moved to a further point in time so you can prepare, or you get to sit at the spot where you’re barely seen, and can use the cheat sheet freely? Well, that’s them.”

“Yeah, but why?” he questioned further, “Why are they doing it? Is it even **fair** to those without guardian spirit?”

“Don’t ask me about whether it’s fair or not, but they can feel the emotions of their chosen person, at least partially, and try to make them as happy as they can,” Pixie shrugged, “That’s how they came to be in the first place.  They care.”

She wanted to say “And your ‘love’ is, at least partially, the result of that feedback loop too” but kept her mouth shut.  He probably knew what he was doing with the whole resurrection thing.

Peter picked up and held the Book pages down as Seb had instructed, thought “Well, here we go,” and said “Solvo!” With a quiet sound of pages rustling, a dip pen fell out of the Book.

“Now that’s new,” Pixie commented, “I didn’t know you could do that.”

“I thought it was going to be a sort-of feather,” Peter scratched the back of his head, “I don’t really know how to use a dip pen.”

“Trust me, it wouldn’t have been any easier with the quill,” Pixie said and offered “I could write it, if you want.”

“No, not you,” Mary said, her lips pressed together in firm expression, “One thing is telling Pete my life’s story, but telling you is another.  Sorry, but I mean it.”

“I’ll go get you a bottle of ink then,” Pixie went for the balcony again.

“But I got this inkwell right here,” Peter picked up the bottle and waved it.

“I think you barely got enough cursed ink for your task,” she explained, rolling her eyes, “You will need some to practice, so that letters become recognizable when you scribble them.”

“Oh,” Peter said.  He didn’t think of that.

#

As soon as Pixie delivered him a bottle of ink (the label was in some weird language, Peter believed to be Russian) he began practicing.

“You don’t need to put the pressure on the nib; it’s of rigid, not flexible variety,” Pixie instructed Peter, “And thank your luck that it’s an oval point, these are much easier to learn.”

“Uhuh,” Peter muttered, and tried writing more.

“What are you doing?!” Pixie exclaimed, “Be careful and don’t smudge it, it dries longer than your typical ball pen ink.” She watched him a little more, then sighed, came closer taking away the pen, and said “Don’t scratch the paper so much; I don’t even understand how you manage to do it with an oval point.  Now watch me.” She dipped the pen in the ink bottle, and wrote perfectly ‘ **Heav'n has no rage like love to hatred turn'd** ’ and whispered Peter in the ear “Don’t try to dip the pen in the ink too fast, or you might actually drop a few ink blots on the paper”.  She slowly dipped the pen in the ink, added a second line below the first one ‘ **Nor Hell a fury, like a woman scorn'd** ’ and whispered again “And don’t hold it in one place for too long, it may leave a blot too.  Now you try.”

“How do you know so much about it?” Peter inquired, looking at her perfect lettering.

“Written contracts; Hell has been using all manners of writing tool for centuries, and many demons fell for dip pens when they appeared,” she explained and snorted, “They think it’s stylish.  I don’t really care, but if you’ve been around for thousands of years, you just pick up things like that.  I still remember that six hundred pages report I had to write with a dip pen in 1941…” her expression became pained, she shivered and closed her eyes, “What a mess it was.”

“War hasn’t been good for Hell, then?” Mary asked feeling a little left-out of the proceedings.

“Technically it was, but as it usually goes,” her lips formed a crooked smile, “Big bosses just find a few jackasses to do all the paperwork, while they simply count the new arrivals and fight for power.  If you ask me, I prefer peaceful times, if only because of the workload.”

 Peter dipped the pen, and tried to write ‘Let there be peace then’; this time he fared better, but somehow his handwriting still looked very angular, at least compared to Pixie’s smooth and round letters.

“No, you’re doing it again, don’t press it so hard!” Pixie rushed to his side.

#

He practiced whole morning; at day he went to the school, and then practiced even more into the night, going to bed very late, but at least he managed to write a page of text without Pixie trying to snatch the pen out of his hands.  Her teaching abilities seemed to congregate around the idea that her student is supposed to get better the more he looks how she does it.  This proved to be quite irritating, because she constantly tried to take the pen away, especially every time when he grasped the meaning of what she was trying to explain.  They almost fought for the pen once, but she won by surprise attack, giving him a cuff on the nape and using the confusion to grab it.

And then the moment finally came.  They had a short day at school because of the surprise inspection by authorities, and Peter was already home at two past noon.  Pixie went to the movies, but she didn’t tell either of them about it.  Peter sat on the floor in his room, Mary sitting a few feet away.

Peter brought a small stack of paper and a plastic clipboard, broke the seal on the inkwell, and with extreme care placed it nearby, as far as possible while still keeping it reachable, so as to minimize the chance of knocking it over.

“Let’s start then,” he risked a smile at Mary.

“I was born in the morning, on August the 12th, year 1991.  I of course, don’t remember much, but the first thing I can recall was the bright light coming from the window in our old house…” she began, very slowly, as she knew he wasn’t that good at writing.

Peter recorded everything, word to word.  Sometimes he would slow down, especially when Mary couldn’t settle on a sentence at once, and produced the one she liked only on second or third attempt.  He let the finished pages dry, and soon was surrounded by quite a few, which he then assembled in the final stack.

The story went quickly at first, but the further they moved, the slower it got, which was understandable.

“…And then the doctor said it is not a benign tumour, but a malignant one; in other words,” she recollected, “I had cancer.”

Peter wrote the sentence down, but held up his other hand, to stop her.

“So you knew?” he asked quietly, putting the pen down.

“Of course,” Mary replied, her eyes never leaving his face.

“And you didn’t tell me?” he said in a toneless voice.

“What could I tell? ‘Hello Pete, I’m gonna die soon’?” she looked down and continued, “You were so full of life, so happy.  **We** were so happy together.  How could I? I hated even the thought of seeing you sad.  And our time together was running out, didn’t want to cloud what was left with you mourning me, while I was still alive.”

“But I would’ve understood! And wouldn’t’ve wandered around alone for months until I met your cousin,” he almost shouted, leaning forward, putting his hands on the floor for support.

Mary’s expression changed to glum, her eyes downcast.

“What am I doing?” he thought, as he considered how it must look from a different perspective.  Because of some past lie, he was now alienating the only person who really cared for him.  He retreated back to his sitting position, but something caught his eye when he looked around.  At first he couldn’t understand what it was, nothing changed in the room – but then he spotted it.

“Mary, look!” he got up and gasped, showing her a stack of papers – the letters started to glow with a faint purple light.

“It is working then?” she asked, still with a slightly dark expression on her face.

“Apparently,” he said, and added with fake cheerfulness, “You know, I understand why you didn’t tell me, I’m sorry for losing my temper there.  What do you say if we continue after a small dinner break?”

As he got up, and prepared to go out of the room, Mary rushed to him and grabbed him by the hand.

“What?” he inquired and laughed lightly when he saw her expression.  It was a mix of worry and dedication.

“I have a bad feeling,” she said, turning her gaze away, as if ashamed of her actions, “Like something bad is going to happen.”

“Oh, please,” he chuckled, liberating himself from her grasp, “It’s not like the fridge is going to explode or anything.”

The kitchen was empty except for a bowl of soup on the table and a small note underneath ‘Forgot your father’s suit at the dry cleaning, coming back soon.  Mom.  P.S.: We’re out of milk for tomorrow, please get some at the grocery if you’re going out.’

The soup was scolding hot, so he thought that taking a stroll outside might not be such a bad idea, besides, the grocery shop was across the street one block away.  He went back to his room to get the jacket, mostly because it could conceal his dirty casual shirt.

“I’m going out to the grocery store,” he told Mary, “The soup is too hot to eat it yet anyway.”

He found her clutching at his sleeve.

“Don’t leave,” she whispered, “I don’t know why, but don’t.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, I’ll be back in five minutes,” he tried to calm her down and smiled, “Remember, I promised – we will bring you back.”

She stubbornly refused to let go.

“Let’s ask Pixie to do it,” she said, clenching her jaw, “Don’t go.”

“Look at yourself,” he reasoned, “This is stupid!”

She let go.

“Maybe it is, just…” she tried to smile.

“I’ll be back in five, nay, let’s make it four – four minutes!” Peter exclaimed.

“See you in four minutes then,” she kissed him on the cheek.

“Silly really,” he thought, going down the stairs and opening the door to the yard.

The weather was so-so, sky hiding behind thick cloud coverage with wind being quite strong, blowing rhythmically and making the treetops sway dangerously in the distance with a sound vaguely reminiscent of ocean waves.

As he walked out of the yard, and proceeded down the sidewalk, Peter couldn’t help but think about Mary’s behavior.  “She is a supernatural creature after all, it might do me some good to listen to her?” he mused to himself.  He stopped and looked around.  The street looked… ordinary.  People here and there, a few cars.  Only the wind seemed to have gotten stronger.

With a loud crashing sound a giant branch of a nearby tree fell on the sidewalk, right where Peter would’ve been if he hadn’t stopped.

“So that’s what it was?!” Peter thought, staring with an open mouth at the accursed piece of wood, “Welp, takes more than that to get me.  Maybe Mary had a point after all, and if so, I’d better hurry up.  Besides, I promised.”

 He almost ran the distance to the grocery store, stopping at the crosswalk.  Seeing the green light, he rushed across the street, wind ruffling his hair.  In a split second, he heard a distant echo of someone shouting and then the world went black.

#

“Peter, can you hear me?”

He briefly thought of Pixie, but recognized his mother’s voice.  He opened his eyes, everything coming into focus very slowly.  He saw a strange room, clean white plaster walls, two windows to the right and his mother’s face with a few more grey hairs than he remembered; and somehow she looked like her old self from the future.  He held on to that thought; he tried to speak, but realized it was impossible with plastic stuff all over his face, and his neck hurt.  Come to think of it, not only his neck hurt, but his back, head and arm were hurting as well.  And his breathing… The whole process felt wrong somehow.

“Don’t try to speak, blink twice if you can understand me,” his mother said, looking at him attentively.

He blinked, twice.  This whole scene seemed somehow familiar, as if it all had happened before.  His sluggish mind still had problems understanding what’s going on.

“Good, I knew you’d make it!” she gave him a hug, as much as it was possible considering the circumstances, “Now try to rest, the doctor said you shouldn’t try to think hard about anything.  I’ll come back shortly!”

Doctor? He’s in… hospital? But why?

“Oh, you’re awake! That’s very good!” a musical voice said, and a vision of beauty entered his field of view.  Perfectly feminine face and amazing auburn hair, partially hidden under a small white cap with a red cross on it.

“You rest now; since you can breathe on your own now, we will remove the tube from your neck, and you will be able to speak again, but try not to strain your vocal cords too much at first, okay?” she winked at him, and clicked something.

He felt peaceful.  Sliding into darkness didn’t seem like a bad idea at the moment, and that was exactly what he did…

#

“Hey!”

Peter felt the inescapable smell of vanilla before he even recognized the voice, and for some reason he felt happy about it.  It was a familiar thing, something to hold on to in the world that’s gone crazy in a blink of an eye.  He opened his eyes.

Pixie looked at him with concerned expression, currently looking the same way she usually looked when she was going to school, though her raven-black hair was tied in a ponytail now.

“You can talk, they removed the tube just as they promised,” she informed him and warned “Don’t touch your neck, it will take some time to heal, and you still got an IV thingie stuck in your arm.”

Peter groaned, and touched his chest with his right arm carefully.  It was tightly bandaged.  He then reached to touch his head with his left arm, but felt Pixie’s grabbing his arm, her skin soft as ever.

“Come to think of it, don’t touch your head too, you had one nasty surgery performed there,” she explained, putting his left hand back down.

“Wha…” he started saying hoarsely, coughed, and tried again “What happened?”

“Bus driver had a seizure or something, he never stopped at the pedestrian crossing, and you were so lost in thoughts that, well…” she told him, a sad expression sliding over her worried one.

“I heard… Mary, is she with you?” Peter searched with his eyes, and tried to get up, but Pixie’s hand, surprisingly strong, stopped him, and he cried “She tried to warn me! She felt it!”

“Sh-h-h-h, you want a doctor or that redhead nurse to chase me away?” Pixie tried to reason, but he was a stubborn man after all.

“Where is she?!” he hissed, writhing furiously under her arm.

“Haven’t seen her around,” Pixie said in a strange voice, “I’m sure it will be alright, you just need to recover and you will search for her then.”

He stopped struggling for a second, and then redoubled his efforts.

“Listen, I’m sure she wouldn’t be happy, if you went searching for her and died on the way,” Pixie almost shouted, trying to keep him in bed, “Or you think of resurrecting her in such a state? Just how far will you get? The furthest point will be reception area, where you’ll be apprehended by many strong men, who will drag you back here and load you full of that crap you humans use to put yourselves to sleep.  Not them pills variety mind you.”

That stopped him.  He sighed uselessly and let his hands drop to his sides, as he himself fell back on the pillow.

“Good boy,” she risked a smile, “Everything’s gonna be alright.”

“I promised I’ll be back in four minutes,” he creaked, feeling miserable.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Pixie tried to calm him down.

“No it was,” he replied, “I knew about the accident.  But last time it happened when I was seventeen.  Must be because we changed the future.”

“I guess,” Pixie said, in a strange voice again.

Peter stared blankly at the ceiling.  Now after his adrenaline rush was over, he felt sick.  His head felt very heavy, his whole body ached, and stomach felt like one giant black hole, sucking on his intestines with vicious hunger, the result of not eating for at least a few days.

“You want anything? Anything at all?” Pixie asked quietly.

“A decent meal,” he replied.

“I’ll have to ask the doctor first; but if it’s okay, I’ll get you something,” she replied, and suddenly chuckled, “I had to tell your parents I was your girlfriend, or they wouldn’t have let me stick around.”

“ **What?!..** ” Peter bellowed, and she laughed some more.

“Don’t worry, we can publically break-up anytime,” she responded with another chuckle.

#

It took him approximately two weeks to recover, and somehow, he had trouble remembering his time in hospital afterwards.  That happened first time as well – brain just didn’t want to keep those memories intact, preferring to keep anything else in their stead.

Then a day came when it was time to leave the hospital.  He had just got dressed, when his mom came in.

“And I thought that girl, Beatrice, was here with you,” she said.

“No, she brought me today’s homework and left,” Peter replied.

“Such a nice girl, I can’t understand why you’ve been hiding her away from me,” she scolded him and added, “She was here from day one you know.  The nurse said she was here even before me and Henry arrived.”

“Yeah, I guess she was,” he replied, and placed his phone in his pocket, but not before checking it for missed calls and text messages.  The calendar said it’s October 17th, and he thought “It means that Pixie won the bet.” He smiled to a memory of his thoughts on the subject – how he wanted to arrange a couple accidents to make her wish she had never agreed to it.  Come to think of it, there wasn’t much he could do to someone, who could alter the reality with a simple spell and change shape on the whim, not even speaking of creating believable illusions.  And then he met Mary, and the bet just didn’t matter anymore.

Arriving home he went to his room, only to find it in perfect order and perfectly clean as well.  He could find neither the dip pen nor the inkwell, and the papers were missing as well.  What he did find, was the small box he gave to Pixie before going to the crossroads.  Peter opened it to discover a dried rose flower inside, a small piece of frankincense and a black plastic hair band.  He smiled at the memories, and focused on remembering Mary.  He furrowed his brows, concentrating.

Nothing happened.  He took the hair band in his hands, and thought even harder.  Even a stray thought was enough for her to appear before, so what was wrong now? A minute passed.  Then two.  Peter started to worry, but relaxed when he heard a sound coming from the balcony.

“You mind?” Pixie’s face peeked inside his room.

“Eh,” Peter turned back to stare at the hair band in his hands, “I thought it was Mary.”

“She didn’t show up?”

There, there it was.  Her voice sounded strange again, same way it did when he asked her about Mary in the hospital.

“Where did you put the papers?” Peter asked, turning the hair band thoughtfully in his hands.

“Behind the box which you told me not to touch, under your bed,” she replied, her voice becoming ever stranger.

Peter was about to reach under the bed, when he felt her hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t,” was all she said.  And of course, he didn’t listen.

“What the hell is this?” he said as he brought the papers out.

“What’s what?” she inquired, avoiding his gaze.

“This!” he stuck the papers under her nose, “Where’s magic?”

“How would I know?” she turned away from him.

“Now wait a second,” he bellowed, enraged and grabbed her by the shoulders to turn her to face him, “You are lying! If ever I’ve seen you do it, you’re doing it now!”

She stared at him, not scared, not intimidated or sad.

“Answer me, goddamit!” he raged.

“You sure you want to know?” she replied in a very-very quiet voice.

“Tell me everything that happened, starting with the bus!” he violently shook her by the shoulders.

She sighed.

“You’d better sit down,” she told him.

#

The movie was terrible.  Pixie watched enough of them already to know the difference.  The soundtrack instead of subtly empowering the general vibe coming from each scene searched to overpower the movie, and actor’s emotions were really bland.  Same blank stares each time they expressed love, hate and sadness.  The drama was also quite stale – any normal girl would’ve abandoned the jerk-protagonist, instead of suffering next to him all the time.

And then she felt it.  As if her heart skipped a beat.  Something had happened.  In a flash, Pixie appeared at the crossroads, where a crowd gathered around a little blond-haired figure next to Peter’s body, lying in a pool of blood on a crosswalk.

“Get an ambulance! Quick, anybody!” Mary was shouting.  The way people reacted, there was no doubt – they could see and hear her.  Pixie could see a crushed bus, stuck in a thick brick fence nearby.  A couple people tried to drag the limp body of the driver out of it, his life apparently saved by the airbag, but he still looked nasty.

Pixie took a look at Peter and bit her lip.  She instantly saw a tiny mark of ink on his palm; for her eyes it was burning with the magic of the curse, which in a few seconds extinguished itself, spent.  Pixie clicked her fingers.  She couldn’t heal wounds, but could alter reality just so that one of nearby cars happened to be an ambulance.  She came closer to them, and turned hysterical Mary’s head to the car.

“Get him in,” she ordered.

#

“Mrs. Talley, you don’t understand!” the doctor waved the CT scan image before Peter’s mother, “I’m not saying we’re not going to operate, I’m just saying that the risk is too high – he might die on the table!”

“And what do you suggest? That we do nothing?!” she exclaimed.

“We could try to reduce the hematoma, and treat it medically,” he pointed at the image, “See here? It’s dangerously close to the brain stem, I will have a hard time convincing any surgeon to take up a case like this.”

“Young man, you’d better not try my patience!” she retaliated.

Outside the room, Pixie and Mary stood in the corridor, both invisible.

“I felt it.  The whole world felt wrong,” Mary said, and lamented, “I should’ve insisted on him staying with me!”

“If we are determining whose fault it was, count me in as well,” Pixie told Mary and looked at her, “If I had been there with him, and not watching movies, I could’ve prevented it altogether.  Besides, the movie was a really crappy one.”

They went to the other room in the hospital, where Peter was lying unconscious on the cot, plastic tubes and wires attached everywhere.  They could see his pulse on the machine nearby.

“He’s going to die,” Pixie stated.

Mary looked at her in disgust.

“Why would you say something like that?” she said angrily “He’s gonna be alright!”

“I see more than you do,” Pixie explained, “He’s like a bottle with water, and someone punched a hole in the bottom.  The life force is seeping out extremely fast; no one can fix that in time.”

“Can’t you do something about it?” Mary pinched her in the side, “You know magic!”

“Not that kind,” Pixie replied with a sigh, “I’m a demon dammit! I can torture people, destroy stuff, maybe create some mischief, but I’m no healer.  Besides, I already did everything I could, if it weren’t for my magic, he’d be dead by now.  It’s like trying to stop water flowing out of a broken dam using only two hands, and compared to that, I fared better than any mortal ever could.”

Mary calmed down a little, her lips pressed in a thin line.

“So what else can we do?” she asked, her jaw set confidently.

Pixie walked away a couple feet, and turned back to look at her.

“I have a theory,” she finally said.

Mary shot her a quizzical look.

“In the future, Peter was immune to my magic,” she started, “And now I think I know why.” She pointed a finger at Mary, “Because of you.”

“What?” Mary asked, her expression confused.

“He had cursed ink on his palm. Did you see how that happened?” Pixie replied to her question with another one.

“Not that I can remember,” Mary replied, looking thoughtful.  Her face darkened, “I think he might have when he leaned forward; we had a small disagreement you see.  Must’ve put his hand on one of the freshly written pages.”

 “Just a little, was it then?”

Mary nodded slowly.

“That is not enough to create the whole accident, but it may be enough to bring the one that is destined to happen about sooner than it’s supposed to,” Pixie explained more.

“So the accident with a bus… happened to him already, in the future or something?” Mary tried to understand.

“More or less yes, that all just a theory though,” Pixie turned to watch Peter again, and added “But I’m pretty sure, that if it weren’t for you, he would die in the future as well.”

“There, you mentioned me again,” Mary came closer, and watched Peter too, “What have I got to do with it?”

“You can save him, by giving him your life force, your humanity,” Pixie spoke after a long pause, “In the process, he becomes more than a human; his soul mutates, to accommodate two in the same body.  Which leaves him immune to my magic, because whenever my magic targets his soul, yours is there to shield him.”

Mary brought a hand to her mouth.  “And the price?” she whispered.

“Your personality, memories, shape,” Pixie listed, and sighed, “Your very individuality.  Everything making you a separate entity.” She thought for a moment and mused “That explains why he lost his memories when I sent him back in time; your souls separated and he became vulnerable to my magic again…”

“So you think in the future, I saved his life, by sacrificing myself?” Mary looked at Pixie, who was surprised to find a smile on her face.  And then she noticed the tears in her eyes, above the smile.

“You are his guardian spirit; I guess you were so desperate to do something when he started dying,” Pixie theorized “That you tried the **ultimate** solution.  And it worked, apparently.”

Mary wiped her eyes, sobbed and said “I’m ready, what should I do?”

Pixie turned to her, gave her an amazed stare, and asked in a suddenly high-pitched voice “You would **really** do it for him?”

“I’m dead already, at least if I can save his life, my death won’t be as useless as it was!” she declared with a fire in her wet eyes.

“Just go to him then, and act on instinct,” Pixie shrugged, trying to keep her composure, despite all the emotions she felt.

“Wait, you’re going to stick around, right?” Mary turned back after a making few steps in Peter’s direction.  “Well, tell him…” she thought for a moment, and added “No don’t tell him anything, anything at all, better if he thinks I’m happily traveling somewhere.”

“You think he will settle for that?” Pixie raised an eyebrow, “My, you mortals don’t really know anything about each other, do you?”

“Well, tell him what he needs to know then!” Mary shouted, starting to cry and running to him, “And take good care of him, you hear me?”

“I will try,” Pixie replied quietly, but Mary didn’t hear her.  She was already leaning over Peter’s body, bright light, only seen by supernatural creatures, emanating from his chest, where her palm slowly disappeared.  Soon, her arm disappeared as well, followed by the rest of her body.

Surgery was going to be successful now, and Pixie relaxed a little.  But she would have to explain.  And the prospect didn’t appeal to her.

#

The plastic hair band fell on the floor, rolled around a little and finally landed still on the side.  Pixie sat down on the edge of the bed next to Peter.

“She didn’t want you to mourn her,” she whispered.

Peter face’s changed color to whiter, paper-like hue; his lower lip trembled.

“I lied,” he said, his voice breaking “I’m a liar.”

“What?” Pixie asked, honest concern on her face, “Peter?”

“I told her I’ll be back in four minutes,” he stared at one point, speaking dispassionately “I promised her I’m bringing her back.”

He hid his face in his hands, and sagged.  He actually sagged so much, that he would’ve fallen forward from the bed if Pixie wasn’t there to catch him.  She gently lowered his head on her knees, and stroked his hair, while he soundlessly cried, shaking a little.

“Don’t cry,” she said, blinking her eyes so as to stop her from crying herself.

 He didn’t hear her.  In his mind’s eye, he saw Mary again and again, from the moment she appeared, to the little goodbye kiss she gave him when they saw each other last.  He felt something scolding hot on his cheek, and turned his face upwards only to see Pixie crying as well.

“It’s all my fault,” she whimpered, hot tears escaping her eyes “If it weren’t for me, you would’ve never seen her, and none of this would happen!”

“I wish I could see her one more time,” Peter whispered hoarsely, “At least to say goodbye.”

“She knew how you feel about her, trust me,” Pixie blew her nose in the napkin she produced from her pocket, and said “I won the bet.  I want my wish.”

“Wha?..” Peter responded weakly.

“Stop crying, that’s my wish,” she said in a ringing voice, “Before you make me cry again.”

“It hurts…” he said with a sob and added “You could wish to live in my room, or a hundred real dinners, and you waste it on that?”

“You’re alive and well, that’s important,” she was on the verge of crying again, “And you’re home.”

“But you’re not.  You’re a little runaway,” he said and smiled, tears still on his face “Unholy runaway.”


	9. Epilogue

“Now if you turn the page, you can see a number of questions about the play,” Mr. Caldwell instructed the class, “I want you to write a small essay, and try to answer them.  I’ll be expecting them next Monday.”

Peter got bored again.  Re-living school years sometimes seemed to be no fun at all.  He looked out the window and went pale.

“Mr. Caldwell!” his hand shot up, “I’m not feeling very well.”

“Sure, go if you need to,” Mr. Caldwell nodded and gave him the concerned look Peter started to hate already.  That was the look everybody at school gave him, because almost everyone heard about the accident and how he cheated an almost certain death.

Peter went out of class, but didn’t go to toilet or infirmary.  He made his way outside, where he thought he saw something from the window.

There was no one there.  He was about to turn back, when he heard piano playing.  It was the same song Mary played after they went to the movies.  Instead of going back, he followed the sound to the school inner yard and gasped.  She was there.  Her blonde hair obstructing the view of her face, but the figure clad in blue sweater and red skirt was unmistakable.

He slowly ambled to her, afraid to scare her with a sudden movement or even tear his gaze off.  As she finished playing she sat very still in the chair.

He approached, and his expression changed.  “Thank you,” he said and closed his eyes, as the unmistakable vanilla smell dispelled the magic in the air.

**THE END**


End file.
